Despite being the film capital of the world, it's actually fairly expensive to make a movie in Los Angeles. While studios are sometimes willing to shell out the dough, it's often much cheaper to go out of state or even out of country where they can receive tax incentives. While this occasionally leads to geographical goofs, they typically go unnoticed by those that don't read about films while they are in production. What this means is that next summer most people aren't going to know that the stateside scenes in The First Avenger: Captain America were filmed only a few miles away from Big Ben.
The Los Angeles Times reports that, in spite of the title, Joe Johnston's superhero flick will be doing all of its filming in London, England. While the plan has always been to make the film in southern California using stages for interior shots and shooting elsewhere for exterior shots, Marvel Studios co-President Louis D'Esposito said that, "it would have required so much visual-effects work and set construction [that] it didn't make sense." Due to the film's budget, Captain America would have been ineligible for California's tax credit but will be receiving 20% to 25% on qualified expenditures from the British capital. Ironically, D'Esposito was recently commended by the Los Angeles City Council for keeping filming locations local and putting money back into the city.
While not making a film with “America” in the title in the United States is a bit strange, it’s hard to fault D’Esposito for his decision. With some exceptions, such as the story's bookends, the bulk of the feature will see Cap fighting German forces in Europe. There are still question marks as to whether the movie-going public will accept the Star-Spangled Avenger the same way they have accepted Iron Man and it doesn't make sense for them to blow millions of dollars just for a "Made in America" sticker.
