Finally, the location you've all (well, some of you) have been waiting for - the location of the "Maple Group Hospital".
I found lots of information online about the fact that Woo and his crew were able to take over a former Coca-Cola bottling plant from Swire (Swire owns the license for all Coca-Cola company drinks in Asia) prior to it being demolished. The problem was knowing which one, because apparently there were three: one in Lai Chi Kok, one in Tsuen wan and one in Quarry Bay. Additionally, I had no idea where any of them were in their respective locales anyway - there's scant information even on the Swire website. Anyway, sometime in the early 1990s, Swire constructed a massive new factory in Shatin and moved all bottling activity to there, freeing up the former sites for sale and redevelopment.
Well, after several hours of combing aerial images, I was able to nail down the location of the factory to Tsuen Wan and can confirm that the site used was on Fui Yiu Kok Street and is now occupied by a huge high rise residential block called "Chelsea Court". If you go to the wiki page for that development, it also mentions that it was constructed on the site of an old bottling factory. Bingo!
Well, after several hours of combing aerial images, I was able to nail down the location of the factory to Tsuen Wan and can confirm that the site used was on Fui Yiu Kok Street and is now occupied by a huge high rise residential block called "Chelsea Court". If you go to the wiki page for that development, it also mentions that it was constructed on the site of an old bottling factory. Bingo!
Looking at the historical imagery, it appears that, like the old teahouse, the factory was also pending demolition when the film crew took it over for production. Although I'm not certain when it was demolished, I can confirm that the site had been cleared by 1994 and was just being used as a temporary storage/car park area and it looks to have stayed that way for the next 10 years until it was redeveloped into "Chelsea Court" (completed 2005).
The odd shape of the site though (a sort of shallow dog leg) meant that the new development forms a similar shape to the old factory, with a kink in the middle, which makes it easier to imagine where the factory in comparison to the current developement. If you use Google Chrome you can click here for a current view. Interestingly, the circular roundabout in the new development seems to more or less coincide with the one seen in the film below (although the new one is much larger).
The odd shape of the site though (a sort of shallow dog leg) meant that the new development forms a similar shape to the old factory, with a kink in the middle, which makes it easier to imagine where the factory in comparison to the current developement. If you use Google Chrome you can click here for a current view. Interestingly, the circular roundabout in the new development seems to more or less coincide with the one seen in the film below (although the new one is much larger).
5 comments:
Hello!
Note, but you should already know it, this place was used for the filming the following year of HEROIC TRIO 1 AND 2, the place is ultra recognizable in both films, even if The film crew has built a kind footbridge in front of the building. In any case, thank you and bravo for all these discoveries! You are seriously ill! :-)
do you mean here or the teahouse?
I just had a quick look on Youtube and I think the footbridge was most likely part of the bottling infrastructure for the factory - a conveyer belt I suspect - that was demolished before Hard Boiled moved in.
No, I don't think so, because it seems to me that "HEROIC TRIO" and its sequel were filmed in mid-1992 and "A TOUT ÉPREUVE" :-) sorry "HARD BOILED filmed in mid-1991. Moreover in" HEROIC TRIO 2 "the dummy walkway is partly collapsed (clearly visible in the first minutes of the footage)
oh ok, I'll have to get a copy and pay closer attention. I'll add it to my "to do" list.
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