Playa de Monsul

Sean Connery appeared in scenes from at least three different films on this small Spanish beach. In Shalako (1968), Connery is a former US Cavalry officer who tries to save a European hunting party from a band of Apaches in New Mexico. The hunting ranch is adjacent to the Monsul beach, though the camera angles carefully crop out the Mediterranean Sea. In The Wind and Lion (1975), Connery “rescues” (or recaptures) Candice Bergen and her two children from a gang of thieves as they are camped out at the Playa de Monsul. And in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), Indy’s father (Sean Connery) saves them both from a German fighter plane in pursuit on the beach by opening his umbrella to scare a flock of birds into the plane’s path. Connery also landed on the coast nearby after being shot out of a US Navy submarine as James Bond in Never Say Never Again (1983). Additionally, the Playa de Monsul hosted Mark Antony’s short-lived peacemaking with a rebellious Sextus Pompey (Antony and Cleopatra, 1972) and Baron Munchausen’s fantastical defeat of the Turkish army (The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, 1988)

Once Upon a Time in Almería: The Legacy of Hollywood in Spain’ (Daylight Books 2017)