The Private Eyes - Hui Bros (1976) - Tin Hau Temple Road, Hong Kong

Credit again to Arthur for locating this similar road scene, not too far away from the previous Braemar Hill Road locale seen in the last post. This time we move down the slope a bit to where Braemar Hill Road intersects with Tin Hau Temple Road.

In the screen caps above, the Porsche is turning right to continue along Tin Hau Temple Road. The road leading from the left is the bottom end of Braemar Hill Road. As mentioned by Arthur in his comment to me when he identified the location, the buildings on the opposite side of the road is still around. They are Ho King View and Tempo Court (from left to right), both built circa 1971 - just a few years before this film was made. Here's what the area looks like now. Thanks Arthur!

The Private Eyes - Hui Bros (1976) - Braemar Hill Road, North Point

A big thanks to Arthur once again for finding the location of this spot from the absolutely great The Private Eyes. When I first saw this screen grab I really had no clue at all as to where it may have been and was considering almost anywhere before consigning it to the help page.

The eventual location, revealed by Arthur, hadn't even been on my possible list which just goes to show how dumb I can be sometimes. Never mind, here it is with surprisingly little change over the past 40 years.

The exact location is where Braemar Hill Road splits into two by Choi Sai Woo Park in front of the Pacific Palisades apartment complex. The building up there on the slope in both the screencap above and Streetview below is the Kiangsu Chekiang College and is still up there.

The Private Eyes - Hui Bros (1976) - Royal Theatre, Mongkok

Sadly now closed, as with many other old cinemas, the Royal Theatre is notable because it was HK's very first 70mm cinema. I have it on good authority (courtesy of the recently released HK Film Archive book about Golden Harvest) that the heist scene in Michael Hui's The Private Eyes was filmed - with a whole bunch of extras - inside the screen of this very same theatre (I believe it was leased to Golden Harvest as one of the GH circuit cinemas at the time).

The ever reliable Raymond Lo provides some info on the place here including when it was closed in 1990. What I can confirm is that it was located at what is now the Pioneer Centre at the Mongkok end of Nathan Road where it intersects with Nullah Road opposite Lai Chi Kok Road.

The Private Eyes - Hui Brothers (1976) - Perkins Road, Happy Valley

Sometimes, not often, locations are quick to find courtesy of some very obvious clues. In this scene from The Private Eyes, the road sign behind our heroes' VW Beetle tells us they are sitting on Perkins Road in Happy Valley.

Thankfully for us, Happy Valley remains one of those areas of HK where much of the older buildings still remains and looking at the current Streetview images we can see the house they are spying on (or at least its front gate) hasn't changed.

The gate is exactly the same! It's either a matching replacement or just very well maintained.

The view up the road (as in the top film grabs) shows that the road's aspect hasn't changed much either, I suspect they are the same trees seen on the film lining the pavement.

This is the current view up the side road where the Hui's had their car parked. The old road sign has gone and there looks to have been some redevelopment at the far end but the walls on both sides haven't changed much.

And finally the view from our intrepid Private I's vantage point looking down the road to the house they are keeping an eye on.

The Private Eyes - Hui Brothers (1976) - Chater Garden, Central

Okay, granted you can't actually see Chater Garden on the next shot but it looks to be the approximate position (perhaps slightly more to the east) from where this shot was filmed. I believe this film was made just after the old Cricket Club grounds were turned into what we now know as Chater Garden circa 1975.

What we have here is a view of Central, lower left you can see the top of the old Supreme Court building which became the Legislative Council building and will soon again become law courts. Above that we have the Princes Building and to the right of that is the Mandarin Oriental Hotel followed by the iconic Jardine House (though at the time was still known as the Connaught Centre) with its round windows - HK's first official skyscraper. Moving on to the right we have the old Hong Kong Club building (such a shame that place was demolished) at the bottom of the screen and hiding behind that is the tower of City Hall. Next to the HK Club we have a building called Sutherland House which stood on the spot that was until recently occupied by the Ritz Carlton (it's currently an empty space).

With two exceptions: the HK Club and Sutherland House, all these buildings remain.

The Private Eyes - Hui Brothers (1976) - Pedder Street, Central

Classic Cantonese comedy from the mid-70's with a catchy theme tune sung by Sam Hui. The opening titles of the film have various snap shots of buildings until stopping on this junction that is actually where Pedder Street crosses Chater Road and Des Voeux Road.

Look carefully up Pedder Street (the road that leads of to wards the top left) and you should be able to make out the Pedder Building. Look right and you can see the old General Post Office with its colonial facade. The GPO was knocked down and replaced by Worldwide House but strangely several of the old columns from the Post Office were preserved and hauled half way up Kwun Yam Shan (behind Kadoorie Farm) where they form part of some bizarre misplaced memorial - perhaps to remind everyone just how crap at preservation HK truly is.