Where Was Guarding Stars Filmed? The Real Location Behind Netflix’s “Montana” Ranch

In Guarding Stars, Leighton Meester’s bodyguard follows Jared Padalecki’s movie star home to his family’s ranch in Montana, where the snow is deep, the fireplaces are huge and the fake relationship gets real very fast. It all looks like Big Sky country. It isn’t.

Like a lot of Hollywood’s snowiest Christmas movies, Guarding Stars was made in Alberta, Canada. Here’s where the cast and crew actually set up, and why that “Montana” might look familiar.

Guarding Stars filming location: Calgary, Alberta

Calgary was the production’s home base for both shooting blocks, according to Canadian film news site Hollywood North Buzz. The movie was made under its original title, The Bodyguard, which is also the name of Katherine Center’s 2022 novel. Padalecki later joked that the title was “already very, VERY taken,” which is why it became Guarding Stars.

Two blocks also explains the look of the film. December gave the crew real holiday-season snow and light, and the late-winter block in February and March kept the ranch scenes properly frozen.

When filming wrapped, Padalecki thanked the city on Instagram for “letting this annoying Texan come and stay in your town for a hot second.” It was a big moment for him: according to Screen Rant, it’s his first live-action movie lead since the 2009 Friday the 13th reboot.

The ranch scenes: High River, Alberta

The Montana ranch scenes were shot in the foothills south of Calgary. Two local Alberta outlets, the Western Wheel and Calgary Locale, reported that the production filmed in the town of High River from December 4 to 6, 2025, right as the town held its Santa Claus Parade. The exact ranch property hasn’t been named publicly, so if you’re planning a road trip, you’ll have to settle for the general vibe.

High River is a familiar face on screen. It’s the real-life home base of the long-running CBC family drama Heartland (no relation to the Jessica Chastain movie), and the wide-open ranch land around it has doubled for small-town America in plenty of other productions.

University of Calgary: the ER, the boardroom and an action scene

Not all of Guarding Stars is cozy. The University of Calgary confirmed that Netflix filmed on campus on December 12, 13, 15 and 16, 2025. The crew used three spots:

• Hunter Student Commons for an outdoor action sequence, which then moved indoors while students watched from above.
• The Clinical Simulation Learning Centre in the Faculty of Nursing, which stood in for a hospital ER.
• A campus boardroom for a boardroom scene.

So if that hospital looks suspiciously spotless, that’s because it’s a nursing school training center. The university said it was the third Netflix production on campus that year.

Downtown Calgary

Local news site Daily Hive reported a sighting of Leighton Meester filming on Stephen Avenue, Calgary’s pedestrian street downtown. That points to some of the city scenes being shot right in the core, though Netflix hasn’t confirmed which scenes those were.

Why so many Christmas movies film in Alberta

Alberta offers reliable snow, mountains, ranch land and a big pool of experienced film crews, all within a short drive of Calgary. That’s why the region keeps standing in for Montana, Wyoming and Colorado. HBO’s The Last of Us filmed its first season around Calgary too, so the same streets can play a post-apocalyptic wasteland one year and a holiday romance the next.

Want the full story and cast first? Read our Guarding Stars cast and release date guide.

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