Hong Kong (series) - Rod Taylor (1960) - 17 Magazine Gap Road, Mid-levels

In the show, Taylor's character, Glenn Evans, lives in a rather swish modern low rise apartment block. In several of the episodes a well used shot of the place is used for establishment purposes and , after a bit of digging around, it turns out that the apartment block in question was the precursor to the current Magazine Heights (which incidentally, I covered not that long ago for Black Cobra Woman).

According to Gwulo.com, this building was constructed at 17 Magazine Gap Road in 1950 and was demolished in circa 1967 when it made way for the current Magazine Heights development. You can see a distant view of it (marked as 9a) here.

There is some other footage of this place, or at least its podium, but you'll have to wait until episode 6 for that.

Black Cobra Woman - Laura Gemser (1976) - Magazine Heights, Mid-Levels

Despite initially thinking that Palance's rather palatial abode was supposed to be 40 Peak Road, some later scenes in the film (when the ambulance comes to take away Julias' girlfriend after she is bitten by one of the snakes) show the driveway the vehicle is parked on is actually that of Magazine Heights - one of the older high rises on Magazine Gap Road. This is also true when Eva returns from her vacation in a taxi and alights at the same place. I guess the filmmakers didn't have permission to film at #40 and this was a compromise.

The later scene gives us a nice view over Central from the building's curved driveway.

Spearhead in Hong Kong - Stafford Gordon (1981) - Magazine Gap Road, Mid-levels

To show his visiting father some sights during his visit, Private Adams takes him and the wife up to a viewing point to admire the harbour vista. Just looking at the buildings in the background I can tell this is a layby along Magazine Gap Road just in front of Magazine Heights at #17 Magazine Gap Road. Even by 1981 standards these buildings weren't new and it's nice to know that they are still around despite now being 50+ years old.

The first image shows the view looking up at Magazine Heights from the road and the following image shows the cobbled retaining wall next to the road that forms part of the podium base. I think the view was filmed from somewhere else (slightly more to the west) though as the angle with Hung Hom and the airport/Hung Hom doesn't quite match. It's interesting to see the big gap in the area that was later filled up by reclamation and the Whampoa gardens development.

Magazine Heights behind

View from Mid-levels looking towards the airport and Hung Hom area

This last photo shows the view looking back down Magazine Gap Road. The development behind is Magazine Gap Towers with it's rather impressive balcony size.