Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Fanling Highway, Kwu Tung

The rather violent denouement to the film takes place on the side of a road embankment somewhere in the New Territories as Yung tries to finish off the newly married couple. This was filmed on a stretch of the New Territories Circular Road (Fanling Highway section) just outside of Fanling. In the film the embankment (thisis the one on the north side of the road) is just a grassy slope in the film, but these days it is covered with mature tree growth. The section we are on is right where the highway goes over the old Castle Peak Road at Kwu Tung. The view inthe background of the top images is looking east back towards Choi Po Court. The last image is looking west towards Ki Lun Shan.

Choi Po Court in Fanling can be seen in the background of the above images

Yung's car crashes under the flyover. Castle Peak Road at the lower level.

View looking west towards Ki Lun Shan in the distance

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Broom Road, Happy Valley

Despite the fact that Lam and Mak had parked their scooter down on Wong Nai Chung Road, when they jump back on it to give chase to Yung, the shot of them driving off was shot upon Broom Road with #7 in the background (before it was given a jolly good spruce up). I'm not sure why this was done but most likely it was a shot that took a few takes and was more easily done away from the main road? Just a guess. You can get a pretty good match up on GoogleEarth here. I guess the filmmakers thought the retaining wall was a good match for the one down on Wong Nai Chung Road.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Wong Nai Chung Road, Happy Valley

Lam and Mak pull up and park their scooter in the small car park on Wong Nai Chung Road, opposite St Paul's Primary Catholic School. Yung and the hitmen park their old red Jaguar not far away near a circular tree planter. In the film this is supposed to give them a view up to the church, but in reality is at least 100m up the road from where the church is located on Broadwood Road. In the last image you can see a low canopy in the top right of the frame.This was located in the playground of the school and was still there until just a few years ago. It was removed sometime between 2016 and 2020.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Wanchai Police Station

On the day of the wedding, the gruff Inspector Cheung (Danny Lee) gets picked up by a police car and taken to the church so he can continue his threats against Chai. But to be fair, considering what's about to happen, that's the least of Ah Chai's worries. I'm not sure what'sgoing on with this old uilding at themoment, the last timeI saw it (a few months ago) it was covered in scaffolding - usually an indicator of a revamp.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - St Margaret Mary's Church, Happy Valley

Ah Chai and Carina get married at St Margaret Mary's Church (often abbreviated to just "St Margaret's") on Broadwood Road in Happy Valley. The long set of stone steps up to the churchs front making a great location for a bit of a brawl and Yung and his hired, Filipino hitmen start shooting indisciminately.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Sasson Road, Pokfulam

Ah Chai falls for Lau (Carina Lau), Uncle Fan's nurse, and they spend one scene walking down a side road on Sassoon Road where Lau sees an abandoned puppy. This was filmed outside the garage block of Stone Manor, the famous Fok residence that was used for some scenes in That Man Bolt.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Yuen Yuen Institute, Tsuen Wan

The respected leader of the gang committe (or whatever he is) calls for a meeting between the two warring gangsters at the Yuen Yuen Institute in Tsuen Wan. A popular filming location for local and foreign movies alike (see here).

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Nai Chung, Ma On Shan

Following their near death experience in Macau, the pair take a day to chill out with the family with a picnic. This is the once open, flat piece of land that fronted the Tolo Channel at Nai Chung. We were here not so long ago on a much brighter day (reminder: Story of Ricky), but it's gone a bit wild since then and the foliage here means you probably couldn't drive a car here anymore.

There's a general mist, as is common in Hong Kong around spring time (so this must have been filmed circa March/April 1986 at a guess), obscuring the distant hills of Tai Po north, but the snippets we can see are of the various closer ridgelines that form the southwestern sections of the Plover Cove Reservoir and the hills around Three Fathoms Cove (last image).

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Avenida da República, Macau

The establising shots for the Macau shootout were done along Avenida da Republica. The first showing a couple of pedicabs heading south on one of the bends. The last image shows a building that is still around, albeit with a new roof. I can't quite workout what the building was used for back in 1987 - Macau experts please feel free to comment - but I can tell you now that the roof was replaced and it now operates as the Macau centre for the "Cruz Vermelha de Macau" aka Macau Red Cross. It's located at #60 Avenida da Republica and just so happens to be next to the plot that contained this place.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Lung Uk, Tsing Lung Tau

The discovery of former grand villas in Hong Kong continues with the inclusion of the house(s) used for the ambush scene as Ah Chai sends Kwok and Yung to make an exchange with a "General" in Macau. It turns out to have been a trap for Chai as a gang of gunslingers turns up to kill them. Cue a huge shootout in and around the property before Chai, sensing something might have gone wrong, turns up with some machine pistols to rescue his men.

This whole sequence was supposedly in Macau, and it cuts a couple of times to Chai waiting in his boat in the outer harbour as he has been warned not to go on land. However, I can confirm that this location, despite the "Bar Bela-Vista" sign in the first image, was shot fully in Hong Kong around a cluster of old villas collectively known as called "Lung Uk" (according to a 1970 map). It consisted of 4 detached houses on a terrace above Castle Peak Road in Tsing Lung Tau.

Unfortunately (yep, you guessed it), they were redeveloped in the early 1990s into the huge "Sea Crest Villa Phase 3" development (Block 10 specifically). The area was also affected by the widening of Castle Peak Road in the early 2000s. Former (now deceased) Chief Secretary of the Colonial HK Government, Sir David Akers-Jones famously lost his house to the same widening project, and nearby Dragon Garden lost a large portion of its lower gardens to the new road as well.

Anyway, here is an aerial image from 1982 to show you what the site looked like when the houses were intact. The building on the left (#4) is the one that is disguised as a cafe in the movie - where "Number 6" (Shing Fui-on) is sitting as the taxi arrives. The main exchange takes place in the next house (#3) along and the gunfight sort of carries on across these two properties and the next one (#2). Far right was #1 - part of the cluster but located down the hill and can't be seen on film. This post is a bit of an image bonanza because I feel these old forgotten places are worth documenting as much as possible.

1982 aerial courtesy HKmaps.hk

On a 1970 map, the house at the back (disguised as a Macau-sounding bar) was #4

Taxi pulls in to #3

General leaves and goes nextdoor to #2, signalling the ambush

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Tip Choi Villa, Block 11, Barbecue Gardens

Ah Chai's house in this movie is a property located in the weirdly named "Barbecue Gardens" estate. My chats with fellow "old house/mansion" fan, Rodney, have elicited that this estate was popular with 1980s TV shows as well as housing a few notable local stars over the years, so perhaps it was one of those people who kindly lent this property for the filming?

This is Block/House 11, or "Tip Choi Villa" as it is also known on local maps. The house was constructed in 1962 and so is of an erain Hong Kong when houses were very much still being influenced by art deco and the like. I can only assume the interiors are real because I'm not sure a production like this would have gone to the expense of creating an interior in a studio. We also get to see lots of the garden. The garden terrace backs directly onto the sea here, which is convenient for when they all head off to Macau on Ah Chai's boat (see image 6). The property is still around and doesn't appear to have changed much. If you watch the sequel, Tragic Hero, you'll see that the house was also used for that movie - not surprising given that the films were made back-to-back - and in the scene where Chai escapes from the house on a speedboat, you can see the chimneys of the adjacent Lok On Pai Desalination Plant in the background. Coincidentally, I just posted about that place earlier this week.

You can see the boat beyond the garden

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Ponte-Cais do Porto Exterior, Macau

The heist sequence, when Kwok and Yung steal a briefcase from Boss Chu's men on behalf of Ah Chai, was filmed over in Macau at what was the old HK<>Macau Ferry Pier a.k.a Ponte-Cais do Porto Exterior.

The scene begins with Yung arriving in front of the pier with the old Casino Jai Alai in the background.  This building is still around as far as I can tell but has been extensively remodelled on the exterior  The ferry terminal area was located where the New Yaohan building stood (between 1992 and 2008) - although this was demolished and (see TST Dave's comment below) replaced by the "Casino Oceanus" - and the pier extended into the water here. It was eventually replaced by the current ferry terminal in 1993.

Anyway, the scene continues as Kwok steals the briefcase on the pier but is stopped by one of Chu's men - Chu being the main antagonist and enemy of Ah Chai.