Monday, May 16, 2011

Soldier of Fortune - Clark Gable (1955) - The Peninsula Hotel, Tsim Sha Tsui

Twenty years before James Bond turned up on the forecourt of HK's iconic hotel, Clark Gable had done the same in Soldier of Fortune. It was the hotel where Susan Hayward's character was staying.

The truth is that Hayward never actually made it to HK because she was embroiled in a child custody battle with her ex-husband, so a stand-in (rumoured to be Jennifer Jones) was used for all the HK based shots and if you watch the film you will notice that all of Hayward's scenes were done in studio mockups or with a back-projection. Sadly this also means the Peninsula's Lobby in the film was als just a studio set - albeit a rather impressive one - as Hayward's presence in there suggests it wasn't the real one. Anyway, here are some more shots of that grand hotel's forecourt complete with the older fountain.

2 comments:

Eva said...

Hi, I'm really enjoying your posts. :)
There is a chase scene in one Pink Panther movie around the Pottinger Street/ Lyndhurst Terrace area in Central. Do you know it?

Phil said...

Thanks Eva - it's the culmination of several of my interests all rolled into one: history, film and Hong Kong.

The Pink Panther is one of those films with HK scenes that I have been meaning to get hold of but just not managed to yet. Pottinger St and Lyndhurst Terrace are fairly well known to HK'ers I feel, but still it's always great to see them on the silver screen.

Cheers, Phil

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