Monument Valley: Utah or Arizona?

Both, actually. Being a chauvinistically loyal Arizonan I am embarrassed to admit that I have never made it to Monument Valley. I have always known that some eighty percent of the Navajo Nation is within Arizona state lines, so I had always taken it for granted that the majority of Monument Valley was also within the state.

I recall hearing for years of Monument Valley being described as located within Arizona. Apparently, Utah has been lobbying hard to change that because it seems that in the last few years I always hear "...Monument Valley, Utah..." so, I looked it up. I expected to find evidence to support my outrage, but discovered that the Navajo Nation defines the park as straddling the Utah-Arizona state line with equal parts in each state. I think that "The Mittens," those three buttes that form a big triangle and may be the most filmed or photographed image of Monument Valley, are on the Arizona side of the park, but not having explored the area myself and not being a cartographer, I am not prepared to argue the point.

Regardless, many parts of the Valley in Utah and in Arizona have been filmed as background in many movies. I think the film crews most often, and maybe always had their field headquarters in Utah because there are population centers there nearer to the Valley.

Given all of the aforesaid, I want to remind my fellow fans of IMDB, that those films that are filmed in "Monument Valley, Utah" often spent at least an equal amount of film in "Monument Valley, Arizona." In addition, the bulk of the Navajo Nation, including the tribal seat, is in Arizona.