The battle scenes were shot around Vouliagmenis Lagoon (north of Loutraki and the Corinth Canal and west of the village of Perachora; northwest of Athens)--not to be confused with the much smaller Lake Vouliagmeni, due south of Athens. The northern Corinthian site doubled as Thermopylae and the surrounding areas as it had become impossible to shoot at the actual location in Thermopylae. The passage of 2,500 years of the receding coastline turned the strait where the actual battle was fought in 480 BCE into a broad coastal plain facing the Malian Gulf adding about 3.5 kilometers of dry land to the coastline by mid-20th century.