An Italian newspaper reports this morning that crew and production team members from "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" have been visiting a series of small medieval towns in the Savona area (near Genoa), with a view to shooting part of the movie in Italy.

I don't know how reliable this is, given they're not supposed to film outside the UK... It might be a second-unit crew. The mayor of Balestrino (one of the small towns) says people from WB have "surveyed" the locations, but are yet to get in touch with the local administration.

However they apparently "loved the atmosphere. This part of Italy offers breathtaking landscapes, what with both the Tirreno sea and the Alps being close by. There's also a centuries-old sanctuary to the Virgin Mary".

A picture of the Castle of Balestrino, where most of the filming would take place, is up at Bad Taste.