Karate from Shaolin Temple - Kazuma Kenji (1976) - Lung Cheung Road Pedestrian Bridge

Another random location that I recently found for this film was the rather distinctive railings that form the pedestrian bridge on Lung Cheung Road close to what is now Plaza Hollywood and Diamond Hill MTR station. The film was shot back when Tai Hom (this area) was still very much a squatter village and you can discern some of the huts at the back of the screen shots. In the background include some still-standing high rise blocks such as the Fung Wong Chuen Building and Fung Cheung Building over in Wong Tai Sin.

The bridge design is quite distinctive but in the 1970s the main road was about half the size it is now. Lung Cheung Road has since been widened to almost twice its original width and as a result the original footbridge had to be extended. They managed to replicate the same design for the newer (northern) half of the bridge. This film was made when only the original (southern) section was in place. If you want a rough comparison you can click on this GoogleEarth link. The marker at the bottom of the post keeps snapping to a location just north of the bridge.

Karate from Shaolin Temple - Kazuma Kenji (1976) - Diamond Hill Cemetery, Kowloon

The cemetery at Diamond Hill features in several scenes of this movie although this was before it underwent a massive modernisation and many of the graves on the lower slopes (near to what is now Po Kong Village Road) were removed/relocated for the construction of new columbarium and crematorium buildings (that can be seen here). This movie was also shot prior to the hill - the "Diamond Hill" that gives the area its name - being removed to make way for what is now a cluster of schools and the Po Kong Village Road Park. Hong Kong is big on preserving names, but physical things...not so much.

Lion Rock is at top left

Just Heroes - David Chiang (1989) - Ping Ting Road, Diamond Hill

Jacky (Stephen Chow) is convinced that Sou (Danny Lee) was responsiblefor the hit on their boss and decides to take revenge by attacking Sou's pregnant wife, Annie (Tien Niu). This takes place outside the East Kowloon Polyclinic on Ping Ting Road. We were in the same location a couple of years ago for Police Story 2 that was shot around the same time.

Hitman - Jet Li (1998) - Po Kong Village Road, Diamond Hill

Fu is dropped off by the side of a road by Lo's daughter (Gigi Leung). You can just make out the name "Po Kong Village" on the sign on the wall behind. This is Po Kong Village Road, although the place that is signposted is now known as simply Po Kong Village Road Sports Centre. This is a stone's throw from a rather elusive location someone (sadly anonymous) found for me a while back.

Golden Studios - Then and Now

As a long-time HK film fan, Golden Studios holds particular interest for me because it was the filming/production location of many classic kung fu and action films during the 70's and 80's. Golden Studios was, of course, the name of the studios owned and operated by Golden Harvest. Sadly the studios are no longer around, but below is an aerial photo of the area in Diamond Hill where the studio was located so that at least we can see where it was in relation to the area now.

Police Story 2 - Jackie Chan (1988) - Diamond Hill MTR Station, Diamond Hill

Continuing the MTR theme from the last few posts and our final station stop for John Cheung is Diamond Hill MTR station. Although again this has changed - drastically - since the film was made. In fact changed again just recently with the opening of the Tuen Ma line (formerly West Rail) extension between Tai Wai and East Tsim Sha Tsui which now goes through the extended Diamond Hill station.

Anyway, the exit that Cheung leaves the station by was removed sometime in the 1990s to make way for an additional block of Lung Poon Court called Lung Wan House. In the top image the only thing still around today are the large vent buildings immediately behind. In the second image (another one missing from my DVD), as he gets into yet another taxi, pretty much all of the buildings in the background have been replaced by high rises with the exception of the Shek On Building. It's the small building with the red facade poking out from behind the exit wall.

Kung Fu Killers - Grant Page (1974) - Golden Studios, Kowloon

Throughout the course of the film, Page manages to conduct a fair amount of interviews including several at what appears to be Golden Harvest's Golden Studios in Diamond Hill where Stoner was being filmed with George Lazenby and Angela Mao. Perhaps not-so-coincidentally Lazenby was to appear in The Man From Hong Kong. Anyway, Page gets to catch up with him and a few others and have a chat in the now-redeveloped studio grounds.

Page also catches up with André Morgan - who should be a well known name and face to anyone who knows their stuff about the Hong Kong film industry. Incidentally, Morgan also had a cameo role in The Man From Hong Kong as a roof top guard as well as being executive producer on it.

Finally he also has a chat with one of the guys responsible for the English dubbing of the movies. AP tells me his name is Michael Ross. He's rockin' a great pair of summer-unfriendly dungarees and I wonder what he is up to these days?

The Man from Hong Kong - Wang Yu (1975) - Diamond Hill, Kowloon

I previously mentioned a rather epic hand glider flight carried out by Grant Page for the opening of this film. It was a flight done in multiple sections and this particular one - filmed around the Kowloon Hills near Diamond Hill - caused a bit of a hassle with the nearby flights from Kai Tak Airport. In this shot we see the hand glider from the vantage point of Shatin Pass Road up in the hills looking down upon what was the actual hill that gave Diamond Hill its name. These days the hill is largely gone, excavated for Po Kong Village Road Park, but there are still some remnants located in and around the Po Kong Village Road.

Those of with sharp eyes and a good memory will remember a similar view from when I was posting about Shatter, and if you page to the bottom of this post, you'll see the same raised lip of earth around the corner of the Shatin Pass Road that can be seen in the first shot below. 

The large housing estate that can be seen in the top picture is the old Tsz Wan Shan housing estate that was demolished over a period of time throughout the 1980's and 90's and replaced by smaller clusters of separately named estates. The flat area in front of the shaved hillside is roughly where today's Po Kong Village Road Park Football pitch now stands - the rest of the hillside has been pretty much completely removed.

In fact, on the other side of the hill is where the Tate's Cairn Tunnel now pops out right next to Chi Lin Nunnery and Nan Lian Garden. As far as I can tell, about the only buildings that can be identified that are still standing are three blocks that line the Po Kong Village Road in the bottom left of the top picture. The leftmost is a CLP substation and the other two are actually schools which may go some way to explain why they are still around.