Classic film location: Bronson Canyon

For almost a century, Bronson Canyon, in the southwest section of Griffith Park, has been a popular location for feature films and television. John Ford used the area for the pivotal scene in his 1956 western masterpiece, “The Searchers,” in which John Wayne rides down the hill looking for his long-lost niece (Natalie Wood), who had been kidnapped as a child by Indians. The first movie to use the canyon as a location was 1919’s “Lightning Bryce.” Over the years, serials such as 1935’s “The Phantom Empire” and 1936’s “Flash Gordon” were shot there as well as such sci-fi classics as 1956’s “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.”