China Cry - Julia Nickson (1990) - Tao Fung Shan, Shatin

As the main character recalls her childhood schooling, we are treated to flashbacks of her attending what is supposed to be a Christian school in Shanghai but was in fact filmed at at place very familiar to readers of this blog: Tao Fung Shan. The bonus this time is we get a quick peak inside (what I believe to be) the large pagoda seen at the back of the top picture.

Vanishing Son - Russell Wong (1994) - Tao Fung Shan, Shatin

Vanishing Son was a TV movie made (but not directed) by Rob Cohen. It follows a couple of brothers who escape to America following the 1989 post-massacre crackdowns. The lead is Russell Wong, a virtuoso violinist and kung fu expert trying his best to look after his brother and himself. Although largely filmed in the states, the beginning of the film is set in China and has a couple of sequences filmed in Hong Kong. The film also features Vivian Wu as one of Wong's student peers.

The first scene is our introduction to Russell as he practices his violin in "Beijing". In fact it is Tao Fung Shan in Shatin. Rob Cohen plays his violin teacher in the scene and it's no surprise when you consider that Cohen himself used the very same location the previous year for filming of some scenes in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story.

We've also seen this place stand in as Beijing in Noble House.

Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story - Jason Scott Lee (1993) - Tao Fung Shan, Shatin

The stand-in for Golden Harvest studios comes from Tao Fung Shan in the hills above Shatin. We see it a few times on film with the name "Pearl of the Orient" Studios.

By sheer coincidence...I have just re-posted an old blog post from my other site with a few more pictures of the place. You can see the post here and it mentions a real-world Bruce Lee connection to the location. Don't forget we have also seen this location previously courtesy of the Noble House mini-series where it stood in for Beijing.

Noble House (Mini series) - Pierce Brosnan (1988) - Tao Fung Shan, Sha Tin

Instead of going through all the hassle of arranging filming permits and the like and forking out all that money to take actors and film crew up to Beijing, the producers of Noble House decided instead to make use of some closer locales to stand in for Beijing. So, when Dunross heads over to the Motherland to do some brokering with the Chinese, all he is really doing is heading into the hills next to Sha Tin train station. The elegant venue is Tao Fung Shan and it's a Christian Seminary built in the style of traditional Chinese temples.

Brosnan's oposite number in China was played by acting stalwart Ric Young who has been popping up in films all over the place since the 1960's. If you've seen Lord Jim you may not have realised that the young native spy who mans the boat up the river with Peter O'Toole was non other than Rick. He also played a machine gun toting gangster in the opening sequence of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom as well as Bruce Lee's dad in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (and many more, but these three I have covered on this blog).