Full Contact - Chow Yun Fat (1992) - Hart Avenue, Tsim Sha Tsui

Next up is one of Ringo Lam's most famous films, Full Contact, released in 1992 and starring Chow Yun Fat as (in some dubs) "Goofy". In the YT version I watched, he is called Jeff in the subs and "Gou Fei" in the dialogue.

Jeff is a gangster based in Bangkok and along with his friends, Chung (Chris Lee), Sam (Anthony Wong) and Mona (Anne Bridgewater) he involves himself in various lucrative plots. Sam gets in trouble with a loanshark - he borrowed money to pay for Jeff's mum's funeral - and Jeff has to free him but as a result makes an enemy of the loan shark. Sam's cousin, Judge (Simon Yam) is a ruthless, murderous gangster, but Sam suggests their gangs team up to do a heist that will earn them all big money. The heist is a disaster and unbeknownst to Jeff and his gang, the loan shark has asked Judge to kill Jeff afterwards. This all goes off in the first 37 minutes of the film and culminates with Jeff supposedly being killed by Sam on Judge's orders. The plot then moves to Hong Kong where Judge and his gang carry on their ruthless business.

Sadly, I haven't been able to get many locations out of this film largely due to most of the scenes being interiors - this means very few clues for me to work with beyond what appears in the film's credits. Nevertheless, there are a couple in here that are quite interesting including the very first HK scene, filmed at a real life bar in Tsim Sha Tsui.

The setting is "The Jouster 2" pub on Hart Avenue as the gang burst in and get the whereabouts of an arms shipment from another local gangster. They kill a few people before grenading the place and heading off to get the goods.

The scene starts with Judge sitting in a car scoping out the pub. As you can see the pub was located on the first couple of floor of Hart Avenue Court. The residential block is still there but the pub has long gone. There is currently a sports bar called AT-LUX occupying the same space.

I believe the railings were over the pub's "moat"

Faux stone interior, made to look like a real castle

This last images shows the opposite block with the Waltzing Matilda Arms

Desperate Mission - Germán Cobos (1965) - Junction of Carnarvon Road and Prat Avenue, Tsim Sha Tsui

Had I paid more attention to these shots below I might have realised a bit earlier that the hotel featured in the film was the Grand Hotel. These shots occur as Z55 leaves the hotel. This is actually a very popular view looking down towards Prat Avenue and Hart Avenue from the junction with Carnarvon Road i.e. looking from directly outside the Grand Hotel. You can see an almost exact repeat of this very same angle over on Gwulo.com. The only discernable change from that 1964 image is the change of business opposite from "Emba Mink House" to something called "Hazel".

Anyway, Agent Z55 sets off after Su Ling (Yôko Tani) and heads off towards Prat Avenue. Relish the relative emptiness (of people and traffic) of these screen shots because this junction is as busy as Piccadilly Circus these days - masses of people and illegally parked trucks and cars blocking the view.

Soldier, Soldier - Robson Green (1992) - The Jouster 2 Pub, Hart Avenue

Many thanks to Gweilo8888 for telling me the position of this next location. He mentioned in an earlier post that The Jouster 2 pub was located in the Hart Avenue Court building along Hart Avenue.

Anyway, here is the screencap for those who wish to reminisce about getting drunk in Tsim Sha Tsui.

Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold - Tamara Dobson (1975) - Lyton Building, Blenheim Avenue

At the start of one of those crazy movie chases that start off in one part of Hong Kong and inexplicably jump to another we find our intrepid agents following a baddie from a hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui. Luckily for us the building involved is still around - it's the Lyton Building on Mody Road, but the entrance we are interested in is the side one on Blenheim Avenue.

Our first clue is the image of John Cheung waiting patiently outside with a sign behind him saying 'Chow Bar Kee'. As luck would have it the business as well as the building is still around - this is the Mody House on the southwest corner of the Blenheim/Mody junction, which puts John well and truly in Blenheim Ave.

The next two shots are less helpful despite the Manna Korean restaurant showing us an address on 32B Mody Road. It turns out that the B refers to the fact that this small  business is actually behind number 32 Mody Road, even though its front entrance is on Blenheim Ave.

Not to worry, here is a recent Streetview (captured in 2009 because it was the clearest picture) which shows that the girls were running out of the Lyton Building entrance. The Manna Korean Restaurant was located in the shop with the black front and as you can see the entrance the girls run from has since had some brown tiling put on it.

Of course the clincher though was the next shot which shows our chasee (is that even a word?) running up Blenheim Towards Mody and the junction where several roads meet - Hanoi Rd, Hart Ave, Mody Rd and Blenheim Ave all meet at the odd junction. Look at the background below and you will see the building that used to sit between the meeting point of Hanoi and Hart. We've seen this building before and regular readers may remember it from Bloodsport a while back. Coincidentally, the Bloodsport scene also involved a chase on foot.

Gambit - Shirley MacLaine (1966) - Hart Avenue, Tsim Sha Tsui

In one of those scenes I mentioned earlier, we see a first person's view of a woman walking away from the camera along a road somewhere in Hong Kong. The woman is supposedly the nightclub dancer character played by Shirley MacLaine and the person whose eyes we are looking through is Michael Caine as he slowly follows her in his car.

Except that, in this only real close up view of the Hong Kong, we are actually following a body double and Michael Caine, when we get a glimpse of him, is actually being filmed with a back projection. In other words, neither actor was ever in Hong Kong for these scenes and it is likely that a local company was hired to film them or a small unit from the US went out to capture what was necessary for the plot.

Anyway, it's done quite well and luckily for us we do get a brief glimpse of what turns out to be a few streets in the Tsim Sha Tsui area of Kowloon. Here are the grabs.

In case you hadn't guessed already, the woman in the green dress and headscarf (conveniently hiding her hair) is supposedly Shirley MacLaine's dancer who Caine wants to recruit for a heist operation. He's following her along Hart Avenue in Tsim Sha Tsui as she walks towards her place of employment.

Luckily for us, this area hasn't changed very much despite the time that has passed (nearly 50 years!) and the fact that a large tract of the area was razed to make way for the U.R.A redevelopment that now has 'The Masterpiece' (and the K11 mall) as its centrepiece.

Anyway, in the first few pictures above we see our body double as she walks south around the rather unique bend of Carnarvon Road where it intersects with Humphrey's, Hart and Pratt Avenues.

As she walks around the corner we see the very distinctive shape of a corner building. This is Rose Mansion and we can also see it in the recent Streetview picture below. This old building on the corner of Prat and Hart Avenues has been around since 1958 and is really about the only recognisable thing left.

After she crosses the road in front of Rose Mansion, our walker heads to the right down Hart Avenue and we get a brief glimpse of how it looked back in the mid-60's (see the last two pictures in the screen grabs). And here it is today. It seems that the right hand side of Hart Avenue is fairly modern compared with the left - and it looks as though the modern buildings have encroached somewhat on what used to be a much wider road.

Yellowthread Street (TV Series) - Bruce Payne (1990) - Enterprise Centre, Tsim Sha Tsui

This is one of those locations that has been made easy for me thanks to the name of the building appearing on screen. It doesn't happen often but it makes life easy when it does.

Anyway, in this case we are at the Enterprise Centre at 4 Hart Avenue. Looking at it you wouldn't believe it is the same building but I have checked the records and can confirm this is still the same place - built in 1976 and still standing. However, the owner of the building has done what most people wouldn't consider - renovate the building completely rather than demolish and rebuild. As a result the outside makes it look like a brand new building.

What appears to be a vehicular entrance in the second shot above has been converted into the main entrance of the building now. The only thing that seems to be unchanged is the double pole of the road sign.

Bloodsport - Jean Claude Van Damme (1987) - Junction of Hanoi & Mody Roads, Tsim Sha Tsui

More from the chase, this time just after our last post where JCVD runs down the road, hides behind a car and runs back again (in a northerly direction), the next shot sees him run out of neighbouring Hart Avenue (seen on the right in the screen grab below), to the junction where Hart, Mody and Hanoi all meet up.

Until the redevelopment there was a lovely corner building here (one of several in this area it seems) that housed a shoe shop. Hanoi is on the left and Hart on the right with Mody Road at the bottom of the screen.

If you look up Hanoi on the left, you can just make out the leaves of the previously seen banyan tree. You can see ol' JCVD just at the front of the corner building as he runs past it and stops at the traffic island (see below).

Want to know what sits on that corner plots now? It ain't pretty, trust me...

Yep, there you go, I suspect that perhaps some of the corner building's footprint has been taken up by the need for extra space courtesy of the MTR entrance/exit you can see above, which is why is seems to have even less space now. There are still some relics from prior to the redevelopment, but you have to look up to the far end of Hanoi Road on the left - you'll see that the same buildings still line the road at the far end (it's Carnarvon Road) despite everything else being completely demolished.