Bons Baisers de Hong Kong - Les Charlots (1975) - Kai Tak Airport, Kowloon

We haven't had a French film for a while so here is another one courtesy of a famous (in 1970's France, at least) group called Les Charlots. The English title of this film was actually From Hong Kong with Love and was a wordplay with the Bond-like theme of the film - it even had cameos from Bernard Lee and Lois Maxwell revisiting their famous roles as M and Miss Moneypenny, respectively.

The plot is silly enough...the British Queen is abducted and taken to Hong Kong by the villain (Mickey Rooney). Les Charlots play the French secret agents who are tasked with getting her back. In all it's a bit of fun and has some fairly amusing scenes as well as some decent locations, but one of the best things for me is the film using real footage from Queen Elizabeth's trip to HK in 1975 and incorporating it into the rather silly plot. It's quite well done.

The action starts off back in Europe but soon moves to HK where we have the obligatory shots of people arriving at the airport terminal. The second pictures shows Mickey Rooney arriving with a double bass case that is supposed to have the kidnapped Queen inside :-)

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Aberdeen Harbour, Aberdeen

This is the last post from this film for a while because I still have some rural locations to identify (it;s proving a bit difficult) but here is a parting shot from Aberdeen at night and we can see the Tai Pak and Sea Palace restaurants all nicely lit up.

This was just an establishing shot for the ensuing scenes but it looks as though what followed was actually filmed back in the studio (at Shepperton Studios according to IMDB) so I won't bother putting it up here.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Hanoi Road, Tsim Sha Tsui

Baker's comrades (which included very young looking John Thaw and Julian Glover) head out to a pub for the night. Unfortunately their nice little drink is disturbed by the enemy (Alex Cord) and they escape out of the front door onto Hanoi Road.

 There are a couple of clues as to the location. The first one is the white sign in the upper right of the lower picture. Look closely and you can see it says "Siu Lam Kung". We've come across this place before courtesy of I Spy. Also spot the sign behind it which mentions "Nancy's Shoes". If you look at the bottom picture of this post (no, I mean the picture at the bottom, not the picture with the bottom!) you'll see that we are in pretty much the same location used in The Man with the Golden Gun. Another confirmation by the fact that the Kam Lung shop is visible in our top picture above.

Anyway, the guys escape in a cab and drive north out of Hanoi onto Carnarvon Road. It's a bit dark, mind you, so not much to see.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Dragon Garden, Castle Peak Road

Another film to feature this rather picturesque private property that sits on Castle Peak Road about halfway between Tsuen Wan and Tuen Mun. This film was before The Man With The Golden Gun, which, I guess, was the film that made the location famous, but we've seen it multiple times on this blog now including I Spy, Men of the Dragon and Noble House. Now that it has been restored it would be good to see it on film again.

The sequence starts with a taxi journey (with Honor Blackman) to the front gate. Now, I have no idea what the Castle Peak Road used to look like but in this film it looks narrow and surrounded with bamboo, so I can't say for certain that this was the actual location of the front gate. However, the appearance of the famous red doors seems to be in favour of it being the right place and not some mock up.

But once we are inside there seems to be no doubt about where we are with the familiar decorations and orange/gold-roofed villa.

And lastly the various Chinese archways and structures on the upper terrace and the nice view over to Ma Wan island in the distance before it was ruined by over-development.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Mai Po, Yuen Long

Sticking with the far reaches of the New Territories and we catch a brief glimpse of some of the wet lands around the Mai Po Marsh area. The area is famous for its almost complete coverage of shallow ponds that were once part of the fish farming industry. There is a cluster of areas here: Nam Sang Wai, Lut Chau, Tai Sang Wai and Mai Po, that are all similar in terrain so it's a bit difficult tracking down the exact spot used in the film.

The hills in the background of the screencap are Ki Lun Shan (a.k.a Haddon/Hadden Hill) on the left and Tai Lo Tin centre screen (a.k.a Snowden) with the north slope of Kai Kung Leng on the right hand side.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Starling Inlet, Sha Tau Kok

There is a quick scene of the soldiers making their way along a rural road as they hunt down their quarry. It just so happens that this particular road is Luk Keng Road in the far north east of the territory. In fact the closed area border (a sort of restricted buffer zone between Hong Kong and the true border with China) the runs along this very same road - enter the inlet and you are officially in trouble if you don't have a Closed Area Permit. To obtain a permit you need to be an indigenous villager whose village lies within the Closed Border Area, or you need to be invited by someone who lives there.

I've tried to match the same angle using Streetview. Note that in the top picture the embankment in the background is where the road turns north along the west end of the inlet. You can't see the turn these days due to the increased amount of growth on the side of the road.

The view looking east is a bit more interesting as you can see the headland that makes up the far eastern limit of the inlet. The headland is called Ah Kung Tsui.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Tai Po, New Territories

One of the key early scenes between Honor Blackman and Stanley Baker was filmed in Tai Po around the former fishing community at Yuen Chau Tsai. This is the same scene, previously mentioned, photographed by our friend over on Gwulo.com.

As a former resident of Tai Po not far from this very spot (I lived there for 6 years) I find this fascinating because the small shanty town here was very real and not created for the purpose of filming. Also my brother-in-law attended the school that can be seen in the background at around the time the filming took place (circa 1969). Anyway, the scene is set with a rather picturesque view over to a very misty Pat Sin Leng.

Then we switch to the road bridge that crossed the rail track and marshland next to Island House on Yuen Chau Tsai. The lower photo shows the two hillocks that are still around and house the Old District Office (North) - the larger hill on the left - and the smaller hill on the right that has the Tai Po Bungalow sitting on top of it. This latter is now the Norwegian International School Kindergarten. The white building at the bottom of the hill is the school I just mentioned. It's the Wong Siu Chi Secondary School and just recently celebrated its 50th anniversary. I believe it was the first Govt Secondary School in Tai Po. It's been expanded since then but the building you see below is still there. 

The camera is then moved further along the road as the soldiers' vehicle drive by. The mat-shed you can see in the top picture may or may not have been erected for the filming. It is certainly the location of a later scene but I'm not sure of it was built specifically for the movie or if they just took advantage of its existence. Again, we get a closer view of the school.

Amazingly, much of the space occupied by the shanty town has remained undeveloped. The huts sat on a small marshland (that flooded at high tide) where the Tai Po River emptied into the harbour and it was - by all accounts - a rather stinky place to be. When the New Twon development started in the early 1980's, most of the town inhabitants were rehoused in the nearby Kwong Fuk Estate and the marshland was re-landscaped so that the river ran down a nullah and the marsh area was reclaimed. Nothing major has been built on here other than a rather pleasant park and a petrol station. I've tried to recreate the same angle as the lower picture using Streetview. You can still see the hillock but the older school building is hidden by tree growth. The high rises centre left are the ones built above Tai Po Market station.

A little later in the film, Baker returns to the same spot to try and get information from the local population and has a good old wander around.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Queen's Road Central, Hong Kong

On the way from the airport to their accommodation - wherever that might be - and the boys are given a quick whirlwind tour around some local streets. I can't quite identify them all at the moment, but this one is instantly recognisable as the junction where Queen's Road Central intersects with Wellington Street. The curved corner building is actually still there and it looks like that whole block was built in the mid-60's.

Here's the current Streetview from a slightly to-the right angle, but you can still make out the features of the building quite well.

The Last Grenade - Stanley Baker (1969) - Kai Tak Airport, Kowloon

It's time for a new film and this time from this not-so-well-known mercenary actioner filmed circa 1969 (but released in 1970) starring Stanley Baker. Baker has been hired to deal with a renegade soldier (played by Alex Cord) causing havoc around the border between Hong Kong and China.

I first heard about this film courtesy of Harryhktc over on Gwulo.com who had posted some sneakily snapped pictures of Honor Blackman and Stanley Baker whilst they were filming in Tai Po (which I will cover in a future post). So anyway, many thanks to Harry for bringing it to my attention because it's a cracker of a film.

Although kicking off supposedly somewhere in Africa, the action soon moves to Hong Kong and we get the usual visit to the airport as Baker and his crew are met by a very young Ray Brooks (Brooks will be forever in my memory as the voice of Mr Benn).

There's some real history in these screencaps including the now defunct Panam and this strange, but cool, passenger transport system. Very futuristic.

Spider-Man: The Dragon's Challenge - Nicholas Hammond (1979) - Jardine House, Central

The finale of the film takes place on what would have been the territory's highest structure at the time, the Connaught Centre, now renamed Jardine House. We get some great views from the top looking down onto the neighbouring roads, as well as a rather impressive shot or two of some intrepid (and sadly anonymous) stuntman crawling up the side of the building.

But first some establishing shots showing the area around the building including the various piers we saw in earlier posts.

Vehicular ferry pier bottom left

Blake Pier

Blake Pier and the later version of the General Post Office. Star Ferry at the back

The GPO and Jardine House next door.

Can you see the small dot on the side of the building? It's our intrepid stuntman, attached by wires to a cradle at the top of the building. We get a close up as well which reveals the concrete finish on the building before it was clad with aluminium tiles.

Definitely not Nichloas Hammond!

Once at the top, Spidey uses his radio transceiver to try and locate his buddy. Cue some rather spectacular views from the top of Jardine House.