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Daley Plaza with its famed Picasso sculpture was the setting for a sensational chase scene in cult movie classic The Blues Brothers (1980). Stars John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, playing ex-criminal brothers, dramatically crash their car through the center’s plate-glass windows, specially installed for the filming, as the authorities hopelessly attempt to stop them.

In Running Scared (1986) Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines are Chicago police pals planning early retirement, but first they must thwart a drug kingpin and stay alive. The final chase scene takes place in the Thompson Center where the two swap wisecracks while swinging on ropes through the airy atrium, shooting out glass elevators, and ultimately triumphing.

The consummate high school comedy Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986) stars Matthew Broderick, who skips school and takes his girlfriend (Mia Sara) and best friend (Paul Ruck) on an action-packed Chicago day. At the Art Institute, Broderick and Sara kiss in front of a window designed by Chagall, while Ruck stares intensely at A Sunday on La Grande Jatte–1884.

Elliott Ness (Kevin Costner) brings down Chicago gangster Al Capone (Robert DeNiro) in the true story The Untouchables (1987). In one unforgettable scene, a shoot-out on a Union Station staircase causes a mother to lose her grip on her baby carriage, which bounces in slow motion down the stairs, saved at the last moment by Ness’s partner.

In feel-good film Hero (1992) John Bubber (Andy Garcia) dupes the public into thinking he’s a hero. Feeling guilty, he resolves to jump off a window ledge at The Drake. Reality interrupted the filming when guests arrived for a party at the hotel. Director Stephen Frears protested so violently, he almost got arrested.

Wrongly accused and convicted of murder, Dr. Richard Kimble (Harrison Ford) dodges the authorities led by Tommy Lee Jones to prove his innocence in The Fugitive (1993). He winds up in a pulse-pounding chase through this grand hotel onto its roof, down its elevator shaft, and into the hotel’s laundry room.

The El tracks are an apt symbol of hard-working Chicago, and they feature significantly in the romantic comedy While You Were Sleeping (1995). Sandra Bullock plays an El station clerk who falls in love with a handsome commuter. He tumbles off the platform, Bullock saves his life, and comedy and romance ensue.

Scare-fest The Relic (1997) starred Penelope Ann Miller and Tom Sizemore as researchers trying to stop a murderous monster before it killed again. Many interior scenes were shot on replica sets but were near-perfect matches to the real museum.

Chain Reaction (1996) sees Keanu Reeves as a science student at the University of Chicago who is framed for murder. In a nail-biting chase scene, he trys to escape by running up the Michigan Avenue Bridge (see Magnificent Mile) as it’s raised.

In Road to Perdition (2002) Tom Hanks is Michael Sullivan, an Irish gangster living in 1930s Chicago. After his wife and young son are murdered, he flees town with his older son. In seeking a safe refuge, they enter a hotel, the exterior of which is the beautiful Wrigley Building. However, the interior scenes were actually filmed at The Hilton Chicago.