Which celluloid hotspot is first on your bucket list - Hollywood or Bollywood?

By Mal Chenu

The world's most iconic sign says it both simply and grandiosely: HOLLYWOOD. Fifteen metres high and 140 metres long, the legendary La La Landmark is a movie star in its own right, having been "destroyed" in no fewer than 12 disaster flicks.

The celebrity sign is the opening credit to your blockbuster trip to Tinseltown, and there is no better place for movie buffs to celebrate celluloid. Bolly-, Dolly- and other prefixes-come-lately are just B-lister Wannabewoods.

So, "Overture, curtains, lights", grab a choc top and let's hit the heights.

And oh what heights you'll hit on the Warner Bros Studio Tour, which takes in the famous water tower, as well as costumes, sets and props from Casablanca to Gravity. You can see the whole script-to-screen Hollywood production process at the interactive Stage 48, where green screens let you ride a Batpod through Gotham City, see how they made the fight sequences in The Matrix and be assigned your Hogwarts' house by the Sorting Hat before mounting your Nimbus 2000 broom for a game of Quidditch at the huge Harry Potter exhibit.

Buy a coffee at Central Perk and relax on the Friends couch in front of the fountain, sit in Sheldon's spot in The Big Bang Theory apartment, snap a selfie with Wonder Woman's lasso, the Batmobile and Aquaman's Atlantis. You can pap yourself walking the red carpet and receiving an Oscar, and they even have merch shops.

At Universal Studios Hollywood, you can do the "world-famous Studio Tour" (that's its actual name) and tackle rides ranging from the gentle Flight of the Hippogriff kiddie-coaster to the plunge down a waterfall on Jurassic World.

The two-kilometre Hollywood Walk of Fame features more than 2700 brass stars embedded in the sidewalks, and along the way you can check out Dolby Theatre, where they hold the Academy Awards, and compare hand prints with John Wayne and Judy Garland at the illustrious Chinese Theatre.

And then you can take in a show at the 18,000-seat Hollywood Bowl, tour celebrities' homes and ride a horse along the Mulholland Trail with its highly recognisable views over the City of Angels.

Of course, you could make your way to Mumbai and check out Bollywood, where stars you've never heard of appear in movies that last longer than a cricket match. In short, you're in for a long night if you wanna Netflix and dahl.

Seriously, if you thought the 222 minutes of Lawrence of Arabia took no prisoners, you should try Venkataraghavan of Madras. And the fact you didn't know whether that is a movie or a spin bowler should tell you everything you need to know. The original Dream Factory is still the gold standard for silver screen cities. Hooray for Hollywood!

By Amy Cooper

Bollywood movies are epic. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll cheer and you'll be seized by the uncontrollable urge to boogie in the aisles. Indian cinema is a superlative sensory spectacle of music, drama, passion and action - and so too is its blockbuster home, Mumbai, known to its fans as Maximum City.

Mumbai packs 23 million people into a sexy slice of India's west coast on the Arabian Sea, amid gleaming skyscrapers and glorious architectural landmarks.

It's rich with cinematic backdrops, from the grand 1924 Gateway of India monument on the waterfront to the 5th-century rock sculptures in Hindu and Buddhist cave temples on Elephanta Island to Marine Drive, a curvy coastal boulevard dubbed the Queen's Necklace for its street lights that resemble the pearls in a necklace.

Charismatic as a matinee idol and all in glorious technicolour, Mumbai makes La La Land look blah blah bland.

When it comes to sets in the city, Bollywood produces more than twice as many motion pictures as Hollywood, and the evidence is all around you.

Start with a studio tour in vast dream factory Film City's 210-plus hectares of sound stages and 42 outdoor filming locations - including lakes, temples and mountains - with the chance to sing, dance, wear Bollywood costumes and maybe curry favour with a mogul or two.

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Most studio tours also visit Mumbai's exclusive enclaves for a squiz at celebrity homes that make Malibu's mansions look like garden sheds. Bandra is Mumbai's Beverly Hills, scattered with piles like Mannat Mansion, the Italian-style villa belonging to superstar Shah Rukh Khan. And if you'd rather pay homage to the God of Cricket, you can swing by master blaster Sachin Tendulkar's palatial pad with its 50-car garage.

More star spotting awaits in glam haunts like Olive Bar and Kitchen, Hakkasan and Bollywood diva Shilpa Shetty's Bastian at the Top, on the forty-eighth floor of the Kohinoor building, then repair to the lush Taj Land's End Hotel's House of Nomad Bar, where movie deals are inked over Bollywood Hopeful cocktails.

Don't miss Mumbai's main megastar magnet: not a nightclub, but the beautiful, gold-domed Siddhivinayak Temple. Possibly the only house of worship with a permanent paparazzi crew, the Hindu temple is visited routinely by Bollywood's top actors, directors and producers seeking blessings from Lord Ganesh for their upcoming projects.

And don't leave without looking for Mumbai's most elusive celebrities: 50 wild leopards living within city limits in Sanjay Gandhi National Park and thought to be the world's densest leopard population.

Oddly enough, LA is the only other major city with wild urban leopard residents - but I still reckon megawatt Mumbai makes Tinseltown look tame.