Monday, July 29, 2024

Mr Hercules Against Karate - Alberto Terracina (1973) - Aberdeen

In another bit of geographical gymnastics, although not quite as weird as merging Victoria Peak with Sydney Harbour, the back of Tiger Balm Gardens apparently leads directly into Aberdeen Harbour as the pair run away from the henchmen by diving into the not-so-clean waters of Aberdeen. This is the eastern end of the harbour because, low-and-behold, in the background of several shots is the dilapidated carcass of the original Jumbo restaurant. Old readers may remember years ago (2011) when I first identified the old Jumbo in the background of a shot from Enter the Dragon. It seems that at least one narrator (I'm looking at you Frank Djeng) had picked up on this for the recent Enter the Clones of Bruce - Enter the Dragon locations featurette, but failed to look further into the location of the Sammo fight. Shame on you. 

Anyway I digress. If anything, it was just an indication of how long the burnt out wreck was left to fester at the side of the harbour since it tragically caught fire in October 1971 i.e. the best part of two years at least.

We see it again, albeit in low-res, during the Aberdeen harbour sequence. The first image below shows Terracina braving the harbour waters to escape the henchmen and, in the second image, you can see the old Jumbo on the left hand side. This shot was taken from the promontory where the Aberdeen Seminary is located. Even in low-res it looks like a sorry sight. In image three, you can see its collapsed roof in the background.

Anyway, that appears to be all from Ming, Ragazzi! aka Mr Hercules Against Karate. The final scenes appear to have been shot at a sort of Chinoiserie-style building, but it's not somewhere I recognise and it wouldn't surprise me if it was in Thailand or the Philippines. If you know better then feel free to let me know (remember, I posted the film link in the first post).

No comments:

Post a Comment