Home Sweet Home Alone is a Disney+ exclusive that continues the Home Alone franchise. The movie debuted on Disney+ Day, November 12, 2021.
While the original Home Alone and Home Alone 2 achieved massive cultural and financial success, it’s follow-ups were much less successful. While this movie is unlikely to recreate that success, it’s a cute movie with a few laugh. In addition, it features a cameo appearance by Devin Ratray, who returns as Buzz McCallister. This gives the movie some continuity from the first two films.
The movie was filmed in Montreal in early 2020. Montreal was chosen as it for the variety of locals, the resemblance to Chicago, and of course the snow. A number of filming locations were discovered by MTLBlog. Production had to be shut down in March due to the Coronavirus, only to resume several months later. I also did some myself research to figure out the location of the main house from the film. I visited Montreal just a week after the film debuted to check out some of the locations.
The Mercer House
The main house appearing in Home Sweet Home Alone is the Mercer house, where Max is left alone when his family jets off to Tokyo for the holidays. The beautiful house is located on a cul-de-sac in a posh neighbourhood. A number of hijinx happen in front of the house when Jeff and Pam try and break in.
The street out front is also where Pam convinces Officer Buzz that they own the house, and there’s no need to investigate. We see a number of other houses on the Cul-de-Sac in these scenes.
There is a public path on the side of the house, but the high stone wall depicted in the film is not real. It was recreated in a soundstage, along with the backyard scenes.
The Christmas Market
Scenes of the Christmas Market were filmed at Parc St. Mark in Longueuil, just across the St. Lawrence River from Montreal. The market is usually packed up after Christmas, but producers had everything left up so they could film in January. When I visited, they had just finished setting up the market for the Christmas season.
Before the movie debuted, there was a lot of buzz about Café Terrace 1957, which is located across the street from the market. Passersby noticed the sign was changed to The Dark Roast Café, leading to speculation that it would be featured in the movie. It ended up being barely noticable in the film.
10 Amigos Tacos
The spot where Buzz is eating a taco in his police car was filmed along a cute street in Pointe-Claire. The sign in the front of the building was changed to read 10 Amigos Tacos, and the building was adorned with Christmas decorations.
The Seniors Home
When we seen Jeff rushing to the concert at the seniors home, the exterior scenes were filmed at the Beaconsfield Golf Club. Interior scenes were filmed at a different golf club which I didn’t visit.
St. Thomas Aquinas Church
The interior and exterior church scenes were filmed at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church in Hudson, Quebec. This beautiful church dates back to 1897, and was renovated in 1925 to it’s current state.
