Blade in Hong Kong - Terry Lester (1985) - View across Wanchai

This next shot is one taken looking across Wanchai. The building immediately to the right is New Spring Garden Mansion on Spring Garden Lane which means that the image was snapped from the Hopewell Centreon Queen's Road East.

Blade in Hong Kong - Terry Lester (1985) - Hennessy Road, Causeway Bay

This is a very busy shot taken on Hennessy Road east of the Canal Road flyover (which can be seen in the far background). It looks quite busy because of the distortion effect of the film camera lens which squishes everything together.

Blade in Hong Kong- Terry Lester (1985) - New World Centre, Tsim Sha Tsui

Another aerial shot, this time of Salisbury Road and the recently demolished New World Centre and Apartments in Tsim Sha Tsui (the brown buildings on the waterfront). There's quite a lot to see in the upper image including the corner of the Shangri-La Hotel and Wing On Plaza (far right), Blackhead Point and the old signal tower, and the Planetarium. The fact that the Cultural Centre is missing behind the planetarium makes me think this isn't library footage but was most likely shot for the film.

The New World Centre and New World Apartments were demolished about 5 years ago to make way for the new (and very ugly) waterfront K11 malls.

Blade in Hong Kong - Terry Lester (1985) - Rocky Harbour, Sai Kung

Another aerial image of some islands, this time it'sa view above Port Shelter looking over Rocky Harbour and the West Dam area. The island with the boats moored in the bay is Tai Tau Chau. 

Blade in Hong Kong - Terry Lester (1985) - Soko Islands

Continuing the opening montage and this time a rare shot looking out over the Soko Islands,just south of Lantau. These islands are now uninhabited but were once the location of a Vietnamese refugee camp - the traces of which can still be seen on Tai A Chau (second large island away from the camera in the screenshot below).

Blade in Hong Kong - Terry Lester (1985) - Lion's Club Pavilion, The Peak

Time for a new film and this series of posts has been several years in the making. It started with me learning about the title of this movie, Blade in Hong Kong, and then trying - for a long time and to no avail - to try and track down a digital copy. Finally, I was alerted to a copy on Ebay by my good friend, AP (he who has provided me with many of the films and shows I have covered on the blog). The only problem was is that it was a VHS tape. It appears this film, made as a TV movie in the mid-80s, has never had a digital release.

So anyway, I bought the VHS tape and then spent the next couple of years unable to do anything about it because of my to'ing and fro'ing between HK and the UK (and getting stuck in the UK, twice!). Only this year was I able to track down a person in Hong Kong who was able to digitise the film for me and I finally got the files back a couple of months ago. Only now have I been able to go through the film and identify a good number of locations. 

The film itself is actually quite good. It revolves around Blade (Terry Lester) who, despite being the adopted son of a rich Hong Kong business man (Keye Luke), runs his own private investigation company and gets involved in a case that targets his dad for assassination.The case coincides with another one regarding the kidnapping of a local businessman's daughter, who is being held ransom.

There are a whole bunch of locations to cover, although much of the opening montage sequence appears to be a collection of library footage, I'll include then anyway. First up is the opening shot of the harbour from the Lion's Club Pavilion on the Peak. The montage returns to the area, a little higher up, for a later part of the sequence (second image).

For some reason the location marker provided by Google keeps jumping to Epworth Lodge rather than the actual location of the pavilion.

All About Ah Long - Chow Yun Fat (1989) - Avenida da Amizade, Macau

Another shot from the race finale as Ah Long races his bike around the R-Bend of the Guia Circuit. It's the home straight of the circuit but in usual times is the Avenida da Amizade. These days the view to the peninsula in the background (that's the still-standing Grand Lapa on the left hand side of the top image) is blocked by the current ferry terminal and it's associated road infrastructure.

All About Ah Long - Chow Yun Fat (1989) - Estrada de San Francisco, Macau

For those who haven't already seen it, the denouement of this film takes place on the street-based racing circuit that runs around peninsula Macau. The Macau Grand Prix is a long-standing and very popular event and once every year the streets are closed off as the various races get underway.

From a practical point of view the film had to be filmed during one of the real Grand Prix (not sure the Macau Govt would have allowed these major roads to be closed for anything other than that event) along the proper, so-called, Guia Circuit. It's an autumn-based event so I expect this part of the film was filmed in the autumn of 1988.

Anyway, in the first of a few street scenes as the bikers race around the course, we get a few glimpses of Macau, starting with the Military Club building along Estrada de San Francisco.

All About Ah Long - Chow Yun Fat (1989) - Lung Kwu Tan, Tuen Mun

The beach where Ah Long, Porky and Sylvia go to prior to the race is located at the westernmost part of Hong Kong's New Territories at a place called Lung Kwu Tan.

All About Ah Long - Chow Yun Fat (1989) - Tai O Mun Road, Sai Kung

A day out with mum and dad and we see everyone in Sylvia's car going for a ride along Tai O Mun Road in Clearwater Bay. It's a fairly deserted road at most times because its destination is the rather exclusive Clearwater Bay club. Look carefully and you will see Steep Island in the background as well as the part of the Clearwater Bay headland that houses the club's golf course.

All About Ah Long - Chow Yun Fat (1989) - Ocean Park, Hong Kong

Sylvia takes her new-found son there for a day out and then proceeds to puke after her ride on the rollercoaster. I haven't been here for nearly ten years and lots has changed and my understanding is that both of these rides have since closed down.

RTHK 3 - Hong Kong Heritage Broadcast - the Jumbo

Following on from the disastrous fate of the Jumbo Floating Restaurant, I was asked by Annemarie Evans of RTHK3 to discuss some of the films it has been featured in over the years. You can find the broadcast here:

https://podcast.rthk.hk/podcast/item.php?pid=164&eid=204279&year=2022&list=1&lang=en-US

This isn't the first thing I have done for RTHK. When Sir Roger Moore died a few years ago, I was invited to chat a little bit about The Man with the Golden Gun which was filmed partially in Hong Kong. I did a post about it at the time here.

For those who don't know what happened to the Jumbo, it was closed due to the pandemic. It's main business for a long time was centred aound large Mainland Chinese tour groups. These dried up due to the pandemic restrictions in Hong Kong and the Mainland, and the restaurant (and adjoining Tai Pak) have been closed since mid-2020.

At one point the Government mooted turning the structure over to Ocean Park, but for whatever reason it didn't happen and the owner instead decided to move it away from Hong Kong. The move was a big secret and no one knew where it was going. It turned out to be heading for a refurbishment at a Vietnamese port but capsized about half-way there and was left to sink. Lots of conspiracy theories have followed.

Hong Kong (series) - Rod Taylor (1960) - Shek Kip Mei Estate, Kowloon

We interrupt usual programming to complete our episode breakdown of the 1960 Rod Taylor Hong Kong series. I originally covered this show several years ago (actually 2019/2020) but couldn't complete the whole series because a single episode - Suitable for Framing - was unavailable. I couldn't find a copy anywhere.

The excellent Rod Taylor fansite was my first point of reference for the complete list of epsiodes, which were initially hosted on Youtube. But the list has since been updated to point to the Internet Archive and the missing episode, Suitable for Framing, has been located.

Sadly, it was largely a studio based episode whereby a shady character (played by Richard Loo) tries to get Glenn Evans framed for murder. There are some exterior shots but none that haven't been used before, other than this one.

I know this was taken in Shek Kip Mei because the angle on Lion Rock on the background is the same one that can still be seen from looking NE up Nam Cheong Street (I live in the area so am very familiar with it). But narrowing down the specific buildings seen in-shot is a bit more difficult.

However, I believe this was taken from Berwick Street between - what was - Block Q and Block P looking up to Block CC in the far distance with Lion Rock above it. This equates to where the Shek Kip Mei "Shopping Centre" (i.e. wet market) now stands at the corner of Berwick Street and Nam Cheong Street (same view today on Street View).

All About Ah Long - Chow Yun Fat (1989) - Mandarin Oriental Hotel, Singapore

Porky goes to spend the weekend with his mum at a local hotel. Except that for some reason the director, Johnnie To, has pulled the wool over our eyes and gone all the way to Singapore (a 3.5 hour flight from Hong Kong) to capture these scenes at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel on Raffles Avenue.

Why was this done? The only explanation I have is that To wanted a hotel with a vast interior that he just couldn't find in Hong Kong. I'm sure a HK film aficionado may be able to provide the real reason. But anyway, the exterior scenes as Ah Long drives Porky to the hotel front, as well as the lobby scenes when Porky goes to meet Sylvia, were all filmed in Singapore. I've included them here just for completeness.

There is also a later scene where another switch is done as Sylvia looks out over Happy Valley and then the next scenes shows a view from the roof of this hotel (bottom image). I'll include that again when I cover the Happy Valley location.