Shanghai Surprise - Madonna (1986) - Kowloon Walled City, Kowloon

Another site that seems to have satisfied the film makers with regards to being dilapidated enough to represent old Shanghai is the Kowloon Walled City. We don't get to see inside the "city", but the ramshackle illegal tenements that formed the outer walls of the place can be seen in the background of the next scene along with the shaved hillside at the back of the Tung Tau Tsuen Road.

The buildings at the back used to form part of the western edge of the slum which would put the filming action pretty much in the centre of today's adjoining Carpenter Road Park near (or perhaps on) the site of the Kowloon City Plaza mall (it was built in 1993).

Shanghai Surprise - Madonna (1986) - Catchick Street, Kennedy Town

The following screengrab seems to just be one of those very brief snippets that serve to illustrate the surrounding environment of the story. I'm sure there is a technical term for this type of thing but I am ignorant in those ways and so will just refer to it as an "establishing" shot. Feel free to enlighten me otherwise if you know.

Anyway, it's a brief look down a seemingly old road in old Shanghai. In fact it was also shot in Kennedy Town along Catchick Street close to the junction with North Street. In fact the modern Streetview capture shows us that a tram stop has since been built but the more observant of you should also see that the red signs above the shop on the right are still the same.

Update 2024: Joseph on Gwulo.com has recently started uploading his tram images and has a BTS image from this shoot, apparentlyit was filmed on 12th February 1986.So there you go. Gwulo thread is here (see secondimage down): https://gwulo.com/node/60319

The old block of buildings on the corner in the background have all been redeveloped into somewhere called the "Harbour View Garden". I'm guessing if you live on lower floors your harbour view may be more along the lines of "harbour no view".

Shanghai Surprise - Madonna (1986) - Kennedy Town Waterfront, Hong Kong

It's changed significantly over the past few decades, but back in 1986 Kennedy Town waterfront was still considered aged enough for the purpose of filming this period set comedy. Most of the old buildings seem to have gone and there has been a proliferation of high rise development making identification of the exact place quite difficult. However, the hills at the back as well as the appearance of Green Island in the background confirms where this was shot.

The hillside in the background of the top grab is actually the eastern flank of Mount Davis and the small hump in the back of the lower two pictures is Green Island. The modern view for comparison is below courtesy of Streetview. It shows the New Praya where I am fairly certain this was filmed, however, pretty much all of the waterfront property here has been redeveloped in the past 20 years.

Shanghai Surprise - Madonna (1986) - Avenida da Praia, Taipa

Despite getting universally panned on release and failing dismally at the box office, Shanghai Surprise is worth watching for HK film fans because it includes lots of locations, some never seen on the blog before. We kick off proceedings with the opening scene shot around the Taipa Houses museum in Macau. If you've never been it is a recommended excursion to catch some breeze along what was then a waterfront location - now landlocked due to the unbelievably tacky and naff Cotai strip reclamation with all its resort casinos.

Kickboxer - Jean Claude Van Damme (1989) - Nai Chung, Ma On Shan

I guess this are should be considered as Sai Kung district rather than Ma On Shan, but seeing as the latter is the closer town I shall leave it for the time being. Besides, a few years later the very same spot (almost) was used in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. Coincidentally, in both films the area is supposed to be in Thailand. In Dragon, it was the substitute for Pak Chong and in Kickboxer it is the Thai village that Van Damme is sent to for groceries by Dennis Chan (Chan is by far the best thing in this film).

I think the production team behind Kickboxer did a better job at hiding the nearby village compared to when Dragon was filmed here. The open ground where this was filmed appears to still be there.

Kickboxer - Jean Claude Van Damme (1989) - Jat Incline, Kowloon Peak

Despite featuring a large section shot in Thailand, Kickboxer was also filmed in Hong Kong which stood in for rural Thailand on a couple of occasions. The first brief glimpse is a shot of Taylor's (played by the Haskell V. Anderson III) battered old blue Toyota HIACE threading its way along a thin mountain road.

  

Rather than rural Thailand we are, in fact, looking at Jat Incline - a small road that runs on the south side of the Kowloon mountain range. Believe it or not if the camera were to pan right you would be presented with urban Hong Kong in its full high-rise concrete glory. The Streetview below gives a rough approximation of the camera's viewpoint. The hill at the far end with the pole on it is actually the summit of Fei Ngo Shan (i.e. Kowloon Peak).

For some reason most maps seem to list this road as the possessive 'Jat's Incline', but actually its proper name is just 'Jat Incline'.

A Countess from Hong Kong - Sophia Loren (1967) - Former Kowloon Docks, Tsim Sha Tsui

Another notable glimpse of the real Hong Kong from this film is a quick view of the wooden pier that used to occupy the spot now taken up by Ocean Terminal. It shows a large cruise ship at dock - the one that all the subsequent action is supposed to take place on - which can just be identified as the SS President Wilson.

We know that this film was released in 1967 which means it was most likely filmed either earlier that year or sometime in 1966. The problem is that Ocean Terminal also opened in 1966 (on the 22nd March according to wiki), quite early on in the year. So either the limited HK locations on this film were shot a couple of years earlier or the film was perhaps some unused footage shot for another movie and incorporated into this one. My gut tells me that the HK images we see on film were licensed from someone else - there is just too little footage to justify spending money on a separate film crew to capture some brief scenes.

Well anyway, if you look at the screen grab below taken from the beginning of The World of Suzie Wong (the original post can be seen here), it's interesting to note that it shows the very same ship berthed at the very same wooden pier - you can even see the curved canopy that runs along the centre of the pier.

The World of Suzie Wong (1960)

I wonder if anyone out there knows how often the SS President Wilson used to berth at Hong Kong in the 1960's? It seems to have been a regular visitor and was eventually bought by CY Tung anyway.

A Countess from Hong Kong - Sophia Loren (1967) - Sun Ya Hotel, Mongkok

A Countess from Hong Kong, starring Marlon Brando and Sophia Loren, only features a couple of short snippets of Hong Kong despite its title. The rest of the film is set on a cruise ship and was thus filmed entirely in the studio. Never mind, because we get a couple of decent locations including this one at what was 639 Nathan Road close to the junction with Argyle Street.

You can just make out the hotel name behind the string of lights on the lower left, but look closely at the background and you can also see the old neon sign for the Broadway Cinema that sat on the corner of Nathan and Argyle St. It was later replaced by the HSBC building that still stands there. It ceased operations in 1966 which means that this little bit of footage was possibly filmed just before its closure.

Lord Jim - Peter O'Toole (1965) - East Lamma Channel

Judging from the screen grabs I have, the sea-based scenes in Lord Jim were filmed all over the territory. The pictures below from quite early on (when Jim is on his first posting) were filmed just south of Hong Kong Island in the East Lamma Channel - it's the strip of water that separates Lamma Island from Hong Kong Island.

The prominent hill in the background is High West on Hong Kong Island. Look carefully just below it and you can see a small island, Magazine Island, that marks the western entrance of Aberdeen Harbour.

The World of Suzie Wong - William Holden (1960) - Hung Shing Temple, Ap Lei Chau

You can tell I am currently on a blitz of forgotten locations, right? Here is one from The World of Suzie Wong that I only really discovered a short while ago. Basically, the reason for these old posts is that I have been revisiting stuff with my current level of knowledge of these places and it's revealing how much I used to miss when I first started out with this blog.

Anyway, just before the couple head to the Tai Pak for their lunch, they head to Aberdeen and Lomax is seen painting/drawing. Look carefully at the following screen caps and you'll see that the actors are on the Ap Lei Chau side of the harbour.

The top picture shows the view looking to the west from Ap Lei Chau. The temple on the left is the very historical Hung Shing Temple on the Ap Lei Chau waterfront. It's thought to be the oldest temple in the area and is now a protected monument. Looking at modern pictures I would say the roof has undergone a renovation recently but it is definitely the same place despite the tidying up of the harbourfront.

The lower picture, from the same sequence, shows Holden sketching Suzie and we can see that this is also on the Ap Lei Chau side because you can just make out the old Aberdeen Police Station in the extreme top right of the picture on the other side of the harbour.