Shadow of China - John Lone (1989) - Dragon Garden, Castle Peak Road

Dragon Garden rears its head again as it is used as the home of Henry's main rival, played by Roy Chiao. We don't really get to see the garden sculptures and instead see the famous pool (Chew Me?), circular terrace and house at the back. I still honestly have no idea if this place is now open to the public so if someone can point me in the direction of some information, it would be appreciated.

The Yin and Yang of Mr Go - James Mason (1970) - Dragon Garden, Castle Peak Road

Although most famous for it's prominent role in The Man with the Garden Gun, we've seen Dragon Garden and the villa inside quite a few times on this blog (Noble House, The Last Grenade, Men of the Dragon to name a few) and although it looks as though no real filming was done here, we do catch a brief glimpse of the villa in one scene.

I suspect this was probably a borrowed clip from somewhere else (perhaps inserted years later?) otherwise I am sure we would have seen much more of the garden etc.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Dragon Garden, Castle Peak Road

Another film to feature this rather picturesque private property that sits on Castle Peak Road about halfway between Tsuen Wan and Tuen Mun. This film was before The Man With The Golden Gun, which, I guess, was the film that made the location famous, but we've seen it multiple times on this blog now including I Spy, Men of the Dragon and Noble House. Now that it has been restored it would be good to see it on film again.

The sequence starts with a taxi journey (with Honor Blackman) to the front gate. Now, I have no idea what the Castle Peak Road used to look like but in this film it looks narrow and surrounded with bamboo, so I can't say for certain that this was the actual location of the front gate. However, the appearance of the famous red doors seems to be in favour of it being the right place and not some mock up.

But once we are inside there seems to be no doubt about where we are with the familiar decorations and orange/gold-roofed villa.

And lastly the various Chinese archways and structures on the upper terrace and the nice view over to Ma Wan island in the distance before it was ruined by over-development.

Men of the Dragon - Jared Martin (1974) - Dragon Garden, Castle Peak Road

Just as in Enter the Dragon, Mr Han had his island fortress (in the shape of King Yin Lei and Kau Yi Chau), our evil bad guy in this film played by Dr No himself, Joseph Wiseman, also has an island fortress. In this case Dragon Villa and Garden are used.

The famous pai fong (a Chinese archway) looking towards the domed mausoleum at the back.

Walking past the stone dragon ornament in the garden pond. We also saw the same ornament in I Spy, The Man with the Golden Gun and Noble House (and many more I'm sure).

This is the actual house with its rather nice ornate front doors, and the shot below shows a nice view across the property and looking over towards Ma Wan island and would you believe me if I told you the island in the far left was Hong Kong Island? It's true. You would be hard pressed to get that much visibility in HK at any time other than the summer these days.

A closer view below of Joseph Wiseman and Katie Saylor sitting in front of the garden's large domed mausoleum.

And after a blind-folded battle pitting the buddies against each other in some seriously hammed up kung fu swirling of the arms and loud screams, the cavalry arrive, in true Enter the Dragon style and mayhem breaks out.

Dragon Garden - some extra info

Thanks to AP for pointing me in the direction of a video posted on YouTube by the Dragon Garden Charitable Foundation. It's just one of those HK stories that are few and far between and it's nice to see a unique piece of HK being preserved for everyone to see (no thanks to the Govt, I hasten to add...).

Edit: I believe that since I first posted this, the owner of Dragon Garden decided against opening up for the public and has since expressed a desire for it to remain private. What a shame after all the publicity surrounding its rescue.

Noble House (Mini series) - Pierce Brosnan (1988) - Dragon Garden, Tsuen Wan

A popular location for foreign film crew because of its 'Chinoise' style, most people will remember it clearly from The Man with the Golden Gun but here we also get to catch a proper close-up glimpse of the house within the extensive grounds.

The famous red front doors to the garden were put into storage when the Govt clawed back some land to widen Castle Peak Road (it went from being a nice bamboo surrounded lane into a highway. One of the doors was reinstalled a while back in its new place and you can see the Streetview below.

The Man with the Golden Gun - Roger Moore (1974) - Dragon Garden & Villa, Castle Peak Road

This place is featured in a famous scene when Bond jumps over the wall of Hai-fat's residence and comes face to face with a naked swimmer who goes by the name of 'Chu-me'. I gather from the film plot that the location is supposed to be in Thailand (at least that's my interpretation of it) but of course the location is in HK (otherwise I wouldn't be writing about it) and still very much in-situ - thanks to the conservational efforts of the original owner's granddaughter - Cynthia Lee - and the helpful hard cold cash of one of her uncles (who managed to buy out the rest of the family).

So the location remains intact, and as long as Cynthia can keep coming up with some nice fundraising ideas it should be kept in fairly good nick (how about leasing it out the TV studios once in a while?). But one thing has changed and that is the front doors.

A while back the local District Council (I think it's Tsuen Wan District for this part of the world, but I could be wrong) needed to widen the well-used Castle Peak Road and the property lost a small part of the land that fronts the road. The original perimeter wall was moved back a few feet and these big red doors were put into storage.