Friday, July 30, 2021

Righting Wrongs - Yuen Biao (1986) - Former Tsuen Wan Transport Interchange, Tsuen Wan

This is the final of my reveals for this film (remember kids, you saw it here first!). This is the location of the fight between Karen Shepherd and Cynthia Rothrock and was able to find it by identifying an overhead road from an earlier part of the scene. Sometimes the most inoccuous details can lead to an identification. This large building was located next to Tsuen Wan ferry Pier and was a transport hub for taxis, buses, minibuses and, apparently, even had a driving school located on the upper floors.

As you recall, the scene starts at TST waterfront as Shepherd kills Louis Fan and a foot chase develops between her and Rothrock. However, nifty editing blends TST with Tsuen Wan and it's actually at this point (below) that the action has already moved to Tsuen Wan as Shepherd pushes past people next to the aforementioned Tsuen Wan ferry pier.


Rothrock next to the ferry pier

Actually, the red upper section of the ferry pier can be seen in several subsequent shots. For example, see below.


Shepherd then runs around what looks like a park before heading over to a nearby red-trimmed pedestrian walkway and into the building where they subsequently fight. This 'park' area was immediately next to the ferry pier, as you can see on the film, and it does indeed appear to have had several walkways that linked the pier area to the transport interchange.


This place was opened in 1986, the same year the film was released, so I suspect we are seeing it before it opened and would explain why the crew appear to have had the run of the place. However, it didn't last very long even by Hong Kong standards and was demolishedsometime between 2011 and 2016 (Streetview still has historical images from 2011 that show it intact but derelict). The site has since been redeveloped into a mall and residential complex called "Parc City".

The old ferry pier has also gone, although I think the construction of Tsuen Wan West Rail MTR station was probably the reason for that one as well as some additional reclamation to the waterfront. The MTR station now serves as the area's transport hub, so I can only assume once it was built the old Transport Interchange seen above became redundant and exacerbated its removal

I'm a bit miffed because the existence of this place more than overlapped with my residence here and, had I looked into this film earlier, I may have had a chance to visit before it disappeared. Such is life, full of lost opportunity. Anyway, thankfully a local blogger did get to go in quite some time ago (circa 2008) and has a bunch of photos you might be interested in.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The location was also used in In the line of duty 4, when Donnie Yen and Cynthia Khan are chased by the police.

Phil said...

thanks anon. I'll get around to covering that film as well at some point. I remember seeing it at a Chinese friends house sometime around 89/90 on a triad pirated video (the UK triads used to run a video lending service of pirated films and shows from HK)

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