Famous people's places / Pontiac
Michigan Motion Picture Studios
Closed – archive entry · 2018
Pontiac's short-lived Hollywood-style studio in a former GM plant, where Oz the Great and Powerful and Batman v Superman were shot.
01 / The story of this place
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In the late 2000s Michigan's generous film tax credits set off a mini Hollywood rush, and Pontiac landed the biggest prize: a full movie studio inside a former General Motors truck plant and office complex on Centerpoint Parkway. The 535,000-square-foot building was bought in 2009 and rebuilt with seven soundstages. It began as Motown Motion Pictures, became Raleigh Michigan Studios under Hollywood's Raleigh Studios, and took the name Michigan Motion Picture Studios in 2012. Its first big feature was Disney's Oz the Great and Powerful, shot here from July to December 2011 by Royal Oak-born director Sam Raimi. In 2014 Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice filled all seven stages. But after the state scaled back its film credits in 2011, productions thinned out and the studio started missing bond payments in 2012. In 2018 aerospace and defense company Williams International bought the complex and the land around it for $44 million and made it its headquarters, ending the building's movie career.
- Converted from a former General Motors plant bought in 2009
- Seven soundstages, the largest about 90,000 square feet
- Sam Raimi shot Oz the Great and Powerful here in 2011
- Batman v Superman used all seven stages in 2014
- Sold to Williams International in 2018 for $44 million
Famous Detroiters
Famous people tied to this place 1
Lexicon entries for the people who lived, worked, performed or liked to spend time here.
- Sam Raimi born 1959 · film director, producer, screenwriter
Worked here
Raimi shot Oz the Great and Powerful here. The film studio later closed and the complex became the headquarters of Williams International.
Sources & fact check · Checked: 2026-09-25
An independently written bilingual guide. This collection is not an attendance-based ranking.
03 / Events
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