Enter the Dragon locations article in "Time Out Hong Kong"

I recently had the good fortune to be asked to pen a short article for Time Out HK magazine. The topic, as you may have guessed already, was the various locations used in Enter The Dragon for which this blog has slowly started to become a valuable source of information – I don’t just mean me finding stuff but also the various people who have left helpful comments that have also pointed me in the right direction. Anyway, for your viewing pleasure, and because it didn’t seem to have made the online version of the magazine, I have scanned it in and with Time Out’s permission, you can view it here for yourself.

Actually, I’m very impressed. The guys at the magazine made me look as though I actually know what I’m talking about and they made good use of the photographs of the locations. What I couldn’t do in the article, but what I can do now, is to thank two people in particular for getting me out of a tight spot. I had most of the photos I needed but was lacking two specific location shots: Tai Tam Bay and Aberdeen harbour. I was all geared up to go and grab them on the previous weekend when the heavens opened and my one free day got pissed on big time. A couple of quick emails later and I had the shots I needed – so a big thank you to Thomas Ngan, who happens to be a regular commentator here and has already added great value to various locations shots such as the Noble House and Jackie Chan’s The Protector. The other thanks go to my Tai Po-based friend Eddy Lo. Eddy is one of those guys who whenever there is a program or news item about Bruce Lee, he’s there in the thick of it. He’s a good friend of Robert Lee (Bruce’s younger brother) and also has many friends at the HK-based Bruce Lee club and he was also with me when I went to Ho Sheung Heung to explore potential spots for the Sammo fight from the film. Anyway, many thanks guys – and luckily both Thomas and Eddy’s photos were included in the final piece.

There were some extra shots I had sent in but weren’t used, I guess because of repetition and lack of space so I’ve also included them below for completeness. Click on the pics for a better view.

So you see, despite only 600 words I managed to cram most of the identified locations in there, just not all of them with accompanying photographs. So here are a few extra that didn’t make it, starting with Ching Chun Koon.

And of course, not forgetting how it looks on the film – an angle which is no longer achievable due to a road and an extra temple building being built right smack in front of the archway (hence why on the above shot I was so close to the damned thing).

I was also told recently by my good friend Wolfgang that the roof on the main temple has been extended slightly. It’s not something I can confirm either way (mainly because tree growth now blocks the view) but is perhaps worth noting in case people are convinced it’s the same location.

I also sent in some pictures of the Muslim Cemetery but I already included these in my earlier post, which can be found here, so no need to rehash it so soon after the fact.

What else? Ah yes, I did try to recreate the angle of a shot taken of John Saxon being pulled around in his rickshaw.

He has just been pulled out of Hankow Road and turned left (towards camera) onto Peking Road. The white car in the background is turning out of the other part of Hankow Road and this intersection now, oddly, has a pavement in the middle of it splitting both roads into two. Thanks to the always helpful Vanessa Seed I now know that the Red Lips bar (seen on a sign in the background) used to be in an alleyway between Hankow Road and Lock Road, and as mentioned in earlier posts, the Club Tasagore (the obscured sign above Saxon’s head) was replaced not too long ago by Delaney’s on Peking Rd. Photo below shows the exact same location today.

Here’s some other stuff that may or may not be of interest. I did do this earlier on the full Bruce Lee entry but have a better shot now.

So as you can see the island on the photo does exist albeit it’s a deserted one (as far as I know, I’ve never been there). It’s called Kau Yi Chau and is due west of the harbour. Of course there was no filming actually done there, but in case you are curious here is shot from GoogleEarth to show you where it is.

The far right is the western tip of HK Island, the reclaimed brown bit top left is Disneyland and the C-shaped island on the left is Peng Chau.

Speaking of Han’s Island, the map shown to Lee by Braithewaite during the briefing shows the outline of another island, one that most visitors to HK will have already set foot on – albeit in a drastically altered form.

Here is the screen grab.

It’s hard tracking down a photo of the island these days, thanks to what is sitting on top of it, but here is one courtesy of the Govt again.

In case you didn’t know or realise already, this island is called Chek Lap Kok and most of it, apart from a small part of the eastern coastline, now sits directly under Hong Kong International Airport. Here’s how it looks today, the (faint) red line traces what’s left of the original eastern coastline (and even that may disappear soon too due to more reclamation plans on the cards.

Anyway, so now you know.

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