Love Circles - Michelle Siu (1985) - Central Waterfront Walkway, Central

The journalist follows Ko-ko to the old waterfront walkway that used to run along the water-side facade of the G.P.O building. In the first image you can see the former Blake Pier in the background and the covered restaurant at the end of the pier (seen in a couple of films over the years here and here).

I'm not sure when the walkway was taken down but I think it was around the same time the Star Ferry Pier building was demolished in 2006 (you can see the Star ferry in the background of the last image). Anyway, the space is now occupied by a paved area in front of the GPO.

I forgot that I was here not so long ago and took a photo. Basically the space right in front of my camera is where the walkway extended to and where the lower two screen captures would have been filmed.

Ghost in the Shell - Scarlett Johansson (2017) - Hong Kong Island Backdrop

I'm going to finish up on Ghost in the Shell with posts that are locations but not locations. There are several occasions where the film makers used a set with HK elements within it, but were actually filmed elsewhere (I think in the case of Ghost in the Shell, the studio sets were done in New Zealand). The first is the culmination of the chase scene involving the re-programmed sanitary worker. as in the anime movie, the chase ends up on a waterlogged area with a cityscape in the background, however, look carefully and you can see several elements from the Central waterfront.

Recognisable buildings in this pastiche include CITIC Tower, the AIA central, CCB Tower, what looks like it might be the Hong Kong Club, HSBC HQ, and to the right of the actor in the lower picture is what looks like the new Central Govt Offices (with some bits added).

Ein Sarg aus Hong Kong - Heinz Drache (1964) - Various Harbour views

I have a bunch of unidentified location still pending for this film (see my help page) so will finish this one for the time being with a variety of clips in and around the harbour area. If you look closely there are some familiar buildings to be found. For example in the top two pictures you can just make out the Marine Dept Building that was later demolished to make way for what was Vicwood Plaza but is now called Infinitus Plaza. It's on the far left in the lower picture.

In these next pictures we can see a tall building next to the old Central Fire Station. The building was originally the Hang Seng Building (which we saw the front of not so long ago) but was later renamed to the Nexxus Building, and is still around albeit in a vastly updated facade. The fire station was replaced a long time ago and strangely enough is now the site for the newer version of the Hang Seng HQ. Note in front of the fire station is the old vehicular ferry pier.

The Million Eyes of Sumuru - George Nader (1967) - Queen's Pier, Central

While his buddy is being kidnapped by Sumuru, Frankie Avalon runs around Hong Kong trying to locate him and meets a mysterious women along the Central harbour front who claims to have information.

The encounter occurs right next to the famous Queen's Pier. It's been a regular feature on this blog. The fate of the disassembled (and supposedly stored) pier has yet to be decided, but it looks as though it may be reconstructed between the two public piers along the Central waterfront.

Spider-Man: The Dragon's Challenge - Nicholas Hammond (1979) - Central Waterfront, Hong Kong

The following screen grabs show a decent swathe of the Central Waterfront prior to the reclamation that saw the Connaught Road ousted from its long-standing position next to the harbour (of course the road didn't move, the waterfront did). We'll start off with a couple of nice harbour shots showing some very small boats bobbing up and down in the harbour. In all honesty, I'm not sure if any of these smaller boats are brave enough to risk going into the harbour these days with all the big boats passing through, but I rarely go there these days despite it being just a few kilometres away. Note Jardine House (formerly the Connaught Centre) centre screen in the top picture followed by a closer view of the General Post Office (with Jardine House being) in the lower picture.

The next few pictures though show the various piers that used to sit along the waterfront. Starting with the outer-island piers (top picture) and moving over past the vehicular ferry pier (left side of picture 2/right side of picture 3) to rest upon the dogleg shape of the final version of Blake Pier and one of the Star Ferry piers. Of course reclamation has long since removed these from their original locations, but the Star Ferry did manage to survive here until 2006.