The Young Master - Jackie Chan (1980) - Abandoned House Revisted, Lam Tsuen

Following on from my previous post where I had quite accidentally stumbled upon the old abandoned house courtesy of a local hiking website (see here for a reminder), I decided to go and get some of my own snaps today, and I think it was perhaps a very good job I did.

This post really epitomises what I love about finding these filming locations. I probably first saw this film sometime in the late 80's/early 90's and many scenes are ingrained into my memory. It's a great feeling to be standing in the same spot you saw all those years ago on film.

Anyway, the house is located next to Ling Wan Monastery (淩雲寺) at the far end of Lam Kam Road in Lam Tsuen (actually, the monastery even has its own bus stop on the 64K route from Tai Po to Yuen Long). You simply alight at the aforementioned bus stop and walk down to take the first left next to the cement plant. Keep following the road and eventually you'll see the following archway marking the entrance to the monastery.

Through the archway and just to the right is the entrance to where the house is, but this is why I think it was a good job I went sooner rather than later: the whole area has been taped off in preparation for demolishing the house. :-(

It seems to be just my luck, as soon as I find a place it gets removed or demolished. Such is life, but I guess at least I got to wander around before it was demolished. I was a bit naughty and snuck through the tape and various warning signs and took a bunch of pictures. I've uploaded many of them here for posterity's sake, because who knows when this place will disappear. I've thrown in the odd reminder from The Young Master as well so you can see how much hasn't changed in 35 years.

As you can see the whole front area in front of the house has been cleared. I think this is preparation for its demolition. Even the tree stumps have been burnt to remove them properly. Access at the moment is via a rather dilapidated stairway on the right hand side of the house. And it brings you up to the area where the actors (Yuen Biao, Shek Kin and JC) sit down when they first arrive.

It even still has the same chunk missing from the side of the back archway. The bit where Yuen Biao is sitting is right at the front and he is just afew inches from a 3 metre drop to the ground. I don't know what was through the doorway behind JC back in 1980, but these days there is a (recently) shot-creted slope, you can just see the concrete on my pictures. Next we move into the room at the back where, in the film, there is a rope attached that JC hauls himself up.

There is a vine dangling down now, but the roof - not in the greatest condition on film - has almost completely collapsed with just a couple of remaining crossbeams. It certainly wouldn't support someones weight now. The window at the top is still bricked in. I wish I knew more about the history of the place because I can imagine it being a fairly stylish home before it fell into disrepair.

The above view is from the other side of the building (the side closer to the monastery) and as such I don't think you can get too far back (such as where Shek Kin and Fung Fung are talking) because it goes into monastery property (although the monastery seems to have illegally taken over Govt land).

Finally, I'll leave you with a few more shots taken of various angles of the place.

Looking in from the front 

The stairs up to the house are on the right of the picture

I wonder what the lower windows were for because although there is an airspace behind them, there is no basement as such. I did speak to one of the nuns in the monastery and she told me the house was a Japanese house, so I wonder if it was built during the occupation and has been abandoned ever since? It's certainly a strange enough design that I haven't seen before. Anyway, enjoy these pictures now because I am sure this place will just be a memory fairly soon.

The Young Master - Jackie Chan (1980) - Ling Wan Monastery, Lam Tsuen

A late entry due to the age it has taken to locate this particular building. It's the ruined building that JC is taken to by Yuen Biao and Shek Kin when he tries to escape by climbing up to the upper floor on a rope whilst shackled. Here's a reminder.

 Thanks to the rather excellent Chinese Hiking in Hong Kong website (a source I use a lot for tracking down the more obscure stuff) and their great photos we can see that this ruined building - located next to Ling Wan Monastery at the end of Lam Kam Road - is still around and still...a ruin. Unfortunately, it's not possible to link directly to the hike under question, but you can scroll down to the following entry to see the other pictures: 八鄉賞花穿村遊 28/2/2015. Meanwhile here is their photo that I have had to embed rather than link to.

I will try and make an effort to get there soon, but in the meantime we'll just have to make do with the picture from the front.

The Young Master - Jackie Chan (1980) - Lok Wo Sha Lane, Wu Kai Sha

This scene is the other one that shares a location with Drunken Master. Sadly, it's a location that is pretty much unrecognisable these days and I have only really been able to ascertain its exact place thanks to a handy 1979 aerial photo I obtained from the local mapping office (these have proved invaluable for this kind of project).

The scene is the one when the evil trio consisting of Fung Hak On, Lee Hoi Sang and Wai Pak intercept the police caravan transporting evil boss dude Whang In Sik from one place to another. Whang is strapped to a cart in the blazing heat, gets free and then unleashes some really awesome retribution to his captors. All of this scene takes place on a sandy track at the foot of Ngau Ngak Shan (a.k.a the Hunchbacks) - part of the mountain that forms the mountains of Ma On Shan.

Unfortunately for us, this area - which has featured on a whole heap of 70's and 80's films - has fallen victim to massive amounts of redevelopment as Ma On Shan has developed into a new town and the Ma On Shan MTR Rail track terminates right next to this location at Wu Kai Sha.

Despite this I figured I would head out there and grab a few shots of the location where most of the action formerly took place, but first here is a reminder of the scene in the film.

 Now, this sandy path was fairly long and connected various points around the Wu Kai Sha area (including what used to be a quarry at Whitehead Point and Starfish Bay) and has since been removed. However, the path's legacy is quite noticeable because, like with many other parts of rebuilt HK, the route the path took hasn't been developed with any buildings but did form the basis for a road that now follows its length reasonably well. The road is Lok Wo Sha Lane and it runs from Whitehead Point, past Starfish Bay and terminates in front of the Li Po Chun United World College.

The part of the path that was the widest - and therefore seemed to be the focus for filming - was a bend that curved from NW to SW at the site of what is now the carpark in front of the aforementioned college.

Here's what I am talking about on the 1979 aerial view. I've circled the part of the path where most of the scene was filmed.

 In a modern context we have the following view from GoogleEarth.

There's been no reclamation along this part of the coastline at all but the development on top is marked, with what was rural farmland and quarries being converted for high rise housing, a rail line, a highway etc.
The area I have circled sits right in front of a small carpark and remains untouched other than being converted into a small green space with trees and flowers.See the photos below of what it looks like today - looking south towards the mountain.

And here is a photo taken from the green area that once saw Whang In Sik kicking 10 bells out of a load of HK stuntmen. Hard to believe it's the same place really, but that's HK for you.

The Young Master - Jackie Chan (1980) - Nr Wong Cheuk Yeung, Sai Kung

The finale of The Young Master takes place on a hillside for which we are given a few clues as to the true location. The first clue is the unmistakable view of the West Dam of High Island reservoir in the background of many angles. Here are a few for starters:

The dam wall pretty much faces a westerly direction so we can assume this location is somewhere NW. Next we can see the hillsides behind some of the closeups of Whang in Sik. Anyone who is familiar with Sai Kung's ridgelines will perhaps recognise some familiar shapes here in the form of Pyramid Hill and Bendy Hill (Wan/Kau Kuk Shan).

 Pyramid Hill is to the left of Whang in Sik

In the above shot we see the pointy bit of

Bendy Hill and (just) Ma On Shan to the right

Speaking of Ma On Shan, here is a shot of it from the angle of Sai Kung. Of course this gives us a fairly decent triangulation of where this scene was filmed. However, since I haven't walked up this particular hill (yet) I can only give an approximation of where it is.

Coupled with a few more shots that give us glimpses over the hills to the Tolo Channel away to the north (and even a brief view of Pat Sin Leng), it appears that JC and his crew traipsed up to a small area called Wong Chuk Yeung. At the top of Chuk Yeung Road the hillside flattens out considerably and the clues in the picture point to somewhere to the east of the village - near to the fire lookout. Possibly close to where Stage 4 of the Maclehose Trail passes. The proximity of the road means the film crew would have had no problem driving all their equipment and actors up there on a daily basis (this scene undoubtedly took a long time to shoot).

The scene of course ends with JC turning superhuman thanks to the wonderful anaesthetic powers of bong water.

The Young Master - Jackie Chan (1980) - Chat Sing Temple, Ma On Shan

Andi has already covered this location quite well in his HK Movie Tour blog but I thought it is worth mentioning that it also gets a very very brief show (blink and you'll miss it) in JC's The Young Master. You catch a quick glimpse whilst JC is doing his best to run away from the Police Chief's son (played by Yuen Biao).

The wall in front of this temple seems to be almost unique in HK and I can't recall having seen anywhere else with it. I have no idea of the purpose it serves other than being decorative. It's no surprise this location was used again in this film as The Young Master shares two locations with Drunken Master, this one and the sandy path that used to be located next to Starfish Bay - both locations within 1km of each other.

Anyway, here is a modern view via Streetview and seeing as this film was only shot 33 years ago (I'm writing this in 2013) it wouldn't surprise me if the tree you can see on the left above is the same one you can see to the right of the temple below.

On a side note, despite watching this film many times in my youth I was too naive to realise that JC gets his super strength from drinking the water from Fung Fung's opium pipe in the grand finale (location to be revealed in a later post).