Bullet for Hire - Simon Yam (1991) - Hau Wong Road, Kowloon City

The boys' next hit is a drive-by shooting in Kowloon City. They drive north along Hau Wong Road with the wet market building in the background and gun down several men standing on the pavement.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Adam Baldwin (2000) - Hau Wong Road, Kowloon City

Despite being filmed in 2000 (actually, August 1999, according to IMDB) - at least a year after the old airport closed - the film has decided to use some library footage showing a plane flying overhead on its approach to Kai Tak. You may recall that Johnny English Reborn did the same, despite being filmed more than ten years after the airport closure). This is the view from Hau Wong Road looking up. The vertical restaurant sign is for a famous restaurant on this road called Lok Hau Fuk (樂口福酒家) which is still around - as far as I am aware.

Geostorm - Gerard Butler (2017) - Nga Tsin Wai Road, Kowloon City

If the sudden jump from Mongkok to Sham Shui Po was too much of a leap of faith for you then this one will send you loopy because the immediate scene following the Wong Chuk Street is in fact all the way over in Kowloon City along the main road there, Nga Tsin Wai Road. Wong Chuk Street suddenly turns into Lion Rock Road as Wu skids around another corner in his attempts to outrun the apocalypse. The first two screen caps show the location from the junction with Lion Rock Road. The lower two screencaps is the view from the next junction with Hau Wong Road. You can make out the EFCC Grace Church building on the left of the screen and the hoardings of the building site that became "Billionaire Luxe" (last pic on left). That rather naffly named condominium building (trust me, by HK standards it's only mildy naff) was completed in 2016 so the fact that it is a building site here appears to fit with the principal photography timeline of 2014/15.

There are some further snippets along the same road but the next block over as we come to the end of the real Hong Kong locations. These next few bits were filmed between Lung Kong Road and South Wall Road.

Seventh Moon - Amy Smart (2008) - Hau Wong Road, Kowloon City

More scenes around Kowloon City as the pair move to the northern part of Hau Wong Road. The "Just Meat" shop closed soon after this film was shot. It was located at 45B Hau Wong Road opposite the wet market.

Banzaï - Coluche (1983) - Kowloon City, Kowloon

The bombing sequence (actually, the plane is just opening its cargo doors and dropping all its luggage) is edited so that footage of planes landing at Kai Tak is cut into shots of people on the streets looking up and being showered with suitcases. The landing shots include a bunch of quick edits of planes flying over Kowloon City area which I have been able to identify below.

The curvy building used to be on the corner of Lung Kong Road
(part of the non-curved section remains)

Looking towards Hau Wong Road from Nga Tsin Wai Road
(before the Kowloon City Govt Complex was built)

Corner of Prince Edward Road and Lung Kong Road

Nga Tsin Wai Road between Nam Kok and Nga Tsin Long Roads

Flying over Ma Tau Chung Road

Les Anges Gardiens - Gerard Depardieu (1995) - Hau Wong Road, Kowloon City

The actual opening shot of the film is a quick glimpse of an aeroplane flying over Kowloon City to land at Kai Tak. This particular shot was taken from Hau Wong Road - identified by the vertical signboard for the now defunct Sum Kam Kee (新金記) restaurant which was at #21-23.

The Chairman - Gregory Peck (1969) - Hau Wong Road, Kowloon City

A small snippet from the same plane scene I posted about earlier but I kept this one for later because there is a quick glimpse of a famous HK restaurant in it.

There is a surprising amount of survivors from this small scene, most notably the Lok Hau Fuk Restaurant (樂口福酒家) whose sign can be seen in the first picture - it's the blue sign directly underneath the plane. I took a picture of this place several years ago on one of my early explorations of HK and by pure coincidence was told a few years later that it was featured in a famous local HK film (directed by Johnnie To) called The Mission (1999). Anyway, the restaurant is one of the few columned shop house survivors that can be found in Kowloon City along Hau Wong Road. Here is my picture (taken sometime around 2008 I think).

It's not a match for the film in terms of angle but that doesn't matter because we can get a pretty good match via Streetview. The grab below shows that most of the buildings seen in 1968 (The Chairman was released in 1969 but actually filmed the year before) including the restaurant, the curved building on the corner with Prince Edward Road West and the tenement behind it further along Hau Wong Road.

The only real change in this area (other than the rather significant removal of the airport to Chek Lap Kok) is that the lower screen grab shows a clear view over to the airport area as the plane flies over. This view is now obscured (and has been for many years) by the flyover built above Prince Edward Road. You can see it below and compare it to the last picture in the series posted above.

Roaring Fire - Hiroyuki Sanada (1982) - Kowloon City, Kowloon

I hadn't realised until I saw this film, but it seems as though the large area in front of the infamous Kowloon Walled City - now known as the Carpenter Road Park - was a small cottage area. In HK this means it was filled with small squatter huts.

Thankfully, the film makers seem to have taken their camera into the Walled City itself and put them up on the rooftops in order to get the following shots.

These first two shots give us a view from the top of Kowloon Walled City towards Nga Tsin Long Road (this is where we were in the last post) in Kowloon City - it's the road with the red shop awnings. The tree covered area is the previously mentioned dispensary.

A little later in the film, when Joji goes back to where his brother was killed, we get another similar view but of the area that is off to the right of these shots.

This first screen capture above shows the dispensary area on the far left of the screen and the white building in the centre is Chi Kam Court (built 1981 - virtually brand new when this film was made!) on the opposite side of Hau Wong Road. It's not white anymore...

 The next building with the brown rectangular pattern is the end of the Victory Building that fronts Lion Rock Road. It is also still around and isn't that clean anymore either :-)

The shanty town is long gone - as is the Walled City - the whole area being turned into one large park area encompassing Carpenter Road Park and the Walled City Park. Incidentally the Kowloon City Plaza has also been built on Carpenter Road right in that space in front of Chi Kam Coiurt and the Victory Building.

Double Impact - Jean Claude Van Damme (1991) - Nga Tsin Wai Road, Kowloon City

Here is a shot that will automatically trigger some very nostalgic feelings within a whole generation of Hongkongers. Yes, a shot of a plane flying low over Kowloon City as it prepares to land at the old airport.

The site of this one is fairly easy to spot because Kowloon City has remained fairly untouched in the intervening years. This shot was taken at the intersection between Nga Tsi Wai Road and Hau Wong Road.

The church you can see in the lower pictures is still around although the Hang Seng Bank branch that was once on the ground floor has been replaced by what looks to be a tutorial centre. I'm sure that you may think that since the airport has moved that the Kowloon City residents have sighed in relief from the constant noise and worry of planes crashing into their homes, but the fact is that many of the businesses in the area have disappeared since they no longer get any foot traffic from the nearby airport. A typical days business during the week in Kowloon City is now only ever even matched at the weekend. However, the area seems to be reinventing itself as a Thai restaurant, Chiuchow restaurant and Chinese hot pot hub. Here is the same location via Streetview.