Filming Locations for The Talented Mr Ripley

“If I could just go back... if I could rub everything out... starting with myself.”

The second filming of Patricia Highsmithís novel (the first was Plein Soleil, which cast Alain Delon as the sexually ambiguous anti-hero) conjures up Italy of the 1960s from a patchwork of niftily chosen locations, not all of them what they seem.

The opening, though, is New York, where Tom Ripley (Matt Damon) works at the Lyceum Theatre, 149 West 45th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues (used in the 1947 George Cukor backstage melodrama A Double Life, starring Ronald Colman).

The interior of Ripleyís dismal basement apartment was actually the ground floor of a tenement on Second Avenue at 26th Street in the Gramercy district, but youíll find the exterior, with the steep flight of iron steps, in the tiny passageway of Franklin Place, between White Street and Franklin Street in Tribeca.

The Talented Mr Ripley location: Tom Ripley's basement apartment: Franklin Place, Tribeca, Manhattan

Taking the job of tracking down spoiled rich kid Dickie Greenleaf (Jude Law), Ripley arrives in Italy at the art deco terminal of Palermo, on the northwest coast of Sicily.

To represent the fictitious resort of ëMongibelloí, where Dickie idles away his time with girlfriend Marge (Gwyneth Paltrow), the movie uses the island of Ischia in the Bay of Naples.

The cobbled square where Ripley gets off the bus is Ischia Ponte, below the towering 12th century Castello Aragonese which dominates the islandís northeast coast. The best way to reach Ischia Ponte is by catching a bus, about a mile east of the ferry landing at Ischia Porto.

Between Ischia Ponte and Ischia Porte youíll find Bagno Antonio, the private beach where Ripley first discovers Dickie and Marge. Close by are Dickieís house and the small harbour where the body of Dickieís girlfriend Silvana turns up during the ceremony of the Madonna.

The Talented Mr Ripley location: Tom Ripley discovers Dickie and Marge: Bagno Antonio, Ischia

The main shopping street and town square of ëMongibelloí, however, can be found on Procida, a neighbouring island, twenty minutes away by ferry.

It gets confusing. The ëVesuvioí nightclub, supposedly in 'Naples', where Dickie and Ripley perform Tu Vuoí Fa LíAmericano is the CaffË Latino, Via Monte Testaccio 96 in Rome, whereas the 'Rome' opera house, where Ripley poses as Dickie, is the Teatro San Carlo, Via San Carlo in Naples. And also in Naples is the imposing vaulted Galleria where Dickie draws his allowance.

The ëSan Remoí jazz festival, where Ripley begins to realise that the idyll is coming to an end, is the seafront at Anzio, on the coast about 30 miles south of Rome (the real San Remo is up at the French border).

Ripleyís Roman hotel, the sumptuous Grand Hotel, Via Vittorio Emanuele Orlando 3 (tel: 06.47091), off Piazza della Repubblica, really is in the Eternal City, as is the cafe where Dickieís obnoxious chum, Freddie Miles (Philip Seymour Hoffman), turns up, on Piazza Navona opposite Berniniís Fountain of the Four Rivers.

The Talented Mr Ripley location: Freddie Miles turns up at the cafe: Piazza Navona, Rome

Photograph: Glen Platts

When he returns to Rome after Dickieís murder, surveying the ruins of the Forum from Capitoline Hill and viewing the monumental sculptures of the Capitoline Museum, Ripley stays in an apartment on the fictitious 'Piazza Gioia', which is actually near the old Jewish Ghetto, on Piazza Mattei. The interior of the apartment ‚ which also functioned as the Grand Hotel suite ‚ is the 14th century Palazzo Taverna, Via di Monte Giordano 36.

The terrace cafe, where Ripley arranges for Meredith, Marge and Peter Smith-Kingsley to meet up, is Cafe Dinelli, Piazza di Spagna, at the foot of the Spanish Steps .

Moving on to Venice, Ripley stays in an apartment which is an amalgam of the abandoned Caí Sagredo and the Palazzo Mosto.

Marge, having arrived at the streamlined, fifties-style Santa Lucia Railway Station, at the northern end of Canal Grande, finally voices her suspicions about Dickieís disappearance at Venetian landmark Caffe Florian, Piazza San Marco 56-59.

The Talented Mr Ripley location: Marge (Gwyneth Paltrow) voices her suspicions: Cafe Florian, Piazza San Marco, Venice

The hotel where Ripley meets Dickieís father is the Europa e Regina, Calle Larga 22 Marzo, San Marco 2159 on the Canal Grande, facing the Chiesa della Salute.

The ‘Venetian’ church, though, where Smith-Kingsley rehearses the ‘Stabat Mater’, is in fact the 14th century Chiesa Martorana, Piazza Bellini in Palermo, Sicily.