Godzilla vs. Destroyah - Takuro Tatsumi (1995) - Nga Tsin Long Road , Kowloon City

I've been doing a bit of spring cleaning on my increasingly creaky desktop and found a couple of images from Godzilla vs Destroyah that I never made into a post. I have no idea if I forgot at the time or just didn't know where the location was. Anyway, after a quick look I can see that this shot was taken at the junction of Nga Tsin Wai Road and Nga Tsin Long Road. The giveaway in this case is the corner of the market building that can be seen on the right of the upper image. The older buildings are still there for the time being.

Beyond Hypothermia - Jacklyn Wu Chien-lien (1996) - Cambo Thai Restaurant, Kowloon City

The Korean tracks down the assassin's handler (played by Shirley Wong) and tries to find out who killed his boss. This meeting takes place at the Cambo Thai Restaurant on Nga Tsin Long Road in Kowloon City.

Irreversi - Mei Melançon (2010) - Nga Tsin Long Road, Kowloon City

The establishing shot for where Adam goes to buy his taxidermy chemicals is Nga Tsin Long Road in Kowloon City. It looks as though the Cambo Pho restaurant seen in the image below is still around.

Seventh Moon - Amy Smart (2008) - Nga Tsin Long Road, Kowloon City

Next up, Seventh Moon, directed by Eduardo Sanchez (the guy responsible for The Blair Witch Project) this film was shot in Hong Kong, but to be honest seeing as most of it was shot at night it really could have been shot anywhere. Other than the odd bit of rural new Territories structures there is nothing here that justifies coming all the way over to Hong Kong to shoot. It has its moments but for me the old shaky camera technique just annoyed me rather than add anything to the tension.

The story revolves around a newly married couple who are in "China" for their honeymoon and are met by a driver (played by Dennis Chan - not his finest hour) who is going to take them to see the husband's family somewhere in rural China. However, it is all a ruse and the driver is in fact taking them to be sacrificed to some bald-headed demons (plenty of those in HK, I'm one of them!) on behalf of his tormented village.

Anyway, the action starts off with the couple enjoying themselves at a local festival. This opening shot is actually in Kowloon City, along Nga Tsin Long Road. The shophouse in the background of the second image stands (or maybe stood...I haven't been down here for a while to check if it still exists) at  #24.

Johnny English Reborn - Rowan Atkinson (2011) - Nga Tsin Long Road, Kowloon City

Back to the modern day for the next few posts as we take a quick look at the few locations that were filmed for Johnny English Reborn. This is another film that I had no idea about until it was released - it seems unless you know someone related to production it's very hard to find out when companies are here doing their stuff.

Anyway, for the introduction shot to HK we are treated to some old Kai Tak approach footage as a plane zooms in over what I believe to be Nga Tsin Long Road in Kowloon City. I guess that the old airport is still an appealing sight for film-goers rather than the relatively mundane approach into Chek Lap Kok. If I'm honest, it still fascinates me even now nearly 20 years after its closure.

Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold - Tamara Dobson (1975) - Nga Tsin Long Road, Kowloon City

It's not the first time we have been down here, but it's a different angle this time so worth including.

The market on the right has since been replaced by the Kowloon City Municipal Services building. There's only a sprinkle of the older buildings remaining here (I think I counted 3 blocks), all the others have since been replaced.

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.

Roaring Fire - Hiroyuki Sanada (1982) - Nga Tsin Long Road, Kowloon City

During the chase sequence at the beginning of the film, when Joji's brother (also played by Sanada) is chased and brutally killed, we catch a quick glance of various places. The glimpses are so quick that most are difficult to identify, but here is one where the camera lingered long enough to reveal some detail.

Just discernible on the right had side is a road sign that looks as though it says Nga Tsin Long Road, and a quick look in Streetview reveals it is indeed that road in Kowloon City. The low rise grey building with black trim at the back is the Lee Kee Memorial Dispensary. Leaky or not (ooh, can you see what I did there...:-)), it is still around and looks pretty much unchanged over the past 30 years - save for some additional rooftop railing. Even the paint job is the same. This is at the northern end of the road where it joins onto Carpenter Road. The dispensary was built in 1951 and opened for business in 1952.

It seems that quite a bit of the filming was done in this area so expect more Kowloon City shots over the coming posts.