We're back up in the Fei Ngo Shan Road/Customs Pass region as the bad guys are followed back to their hideout by 009. This property was actually still around until circa 2010 when it was finally replaced by a more modern mansion. What a shame, so many of these houses were so stylish compared to their modern day replacements. Money doesn't buy you taste I'm afraid. If you want to see what it looked like just prior to demolition, go here:
GoogleEarth.
This is location where the gang boss, played by Margaret Tu Chuan, lives surrounded by her henchmen. It's hinted in the film that she answers to someone higher up but I don't recall this particular plot loose end being tied up.
When 009 first approaches, he parks his car outside a house on the opposite side of the road - #10 - and it's a property we have seen a little bit of
previously.
Fei Ngo Shan Road
#11 - Hillside VillaParking outside #10
2 comments:
Ah, it seems this was Shaw Brothers' favourite street. On some older maps this house was named Siao Yu Chia. If I find anything more about the house using that name, I will add in the comments. Such a shame this house was knocked down after it was sold in 2008 for $180,380,000. The version of the house seen in the film was only 5,000 sq. ft., but permissible footage was 8,000 sq. ft., so it had to go.
The house next door, Villa Serene, appeared in Shaw's River of Tears. It too has been redeveloped, though a couple of estates agency websites still have it on a 1960 occupational permit. It is limited to members only on Shaw's YouTube page, but I believe The Dancing Millionairess might have been filmed at a house on Fei Ngo Shan as well.
And so the mystery depends... What was the catalyst for so man architecturally interesting houses to sprout up here all of a sudden? How did Shaw get access to multiple houses? Wouldn't it be something if they managed to film at every house that was there during the 1960s? I can't believe they offered the already wealthy owners wheelbarrows full of cash to film on their grounds.
Hi Rodney, it wouldn't surprise me if afew Shaw execs owned afew of the properties at some point. Not many of his actors could earn that much money because they were all on standard salaried contracts.
Given HK's growth as a manufacturing centre at the time though, I bet most of them were owned by factory owners and industrialists. It's a big chunk of missing HK history I feel.
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