Tokyo Fox (東京狐) Is 5 Years Old Today!

Who would have thought it but this site has made it to its 5th birthday! There will be no big feature here though about the ups and downs or the best moments over the last half decade. Instead I will just list (in no particular order) the top 5 most popular blog entries based on my memory of what appears in my stats when I can be bothered to look at them.

* Pantsu Getta – The Latest Pervy Japanese Game – July 2006

* Euro Trip 2010 Pt VII: Star Wars Traveller – Naboo (a.k.a. Villa Del Balbianello) – September 2010

* African Festival Yokohama – April 2008

* London Pt I: Star Wars Traveller – Naboo (a.k.a. Watford) – January 2011

* Berlin Pt III: The Bourne Supremacy Filming Locations – January 2011

Posted in Africa Travel, Euro Travel, Hentai, Quirky Japan, Star Wars Filming Locations | Leave a comment

London Filming Locations: James Bond Special

The Bond franchise is famed for its glamorous locations from around the world but the true home of 007 is in London, mainly due to the MI6 headquarters being located there. As well as the various places used for that role, the nations capital has also appeared in many other guises and Tokyo Fox made it its mission to find as many of the shooting locations as possible.

First up is one of the most iconic moments in the whole 007 series as its where Sean Connery delivers the line “The name’s Bond….James Bond” in the 1962 debut ‘Dr No‘. That place is supposedly the chemin-de-fer table in Le Cercle Club at Les Ambassadeurs (below) in Hamilton Place but don’t get too excited as the interior was actually filmed at Pinewood Studio’s.

 

Next is Brent Cross Shopping Centre and it’s car park (below); the 4th floor of which played the part of Hamburg in Tomorrow Never Dies‘ (1997) starring Pierce Brosnan.

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In the same movie the courtyard of Somerset House (below) at The Strand was used as MI6 HQ whereas in the previous Brosnan outing ‘GoldenEye’ (1995) it doubled up as St Petersburg.

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Other “Russian” locations in London to feature in ‘GoldenEye’ include the Langham Hilton at Portland Place (below).

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Brompton Cemetry (below) is the exterior of the St Petersburg church where Natalya meets Boris by chance.

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The interior is St Sofia’s Cathedral (below) which funnily enough is on Moscow Road near Bayswater Station.

 

One final “Russian” location is Drapers’ Hall (below) on Throgmorton Street near Bank station. It is the St Petersburg council chamber in ‘GoldenEye’ where a General discovers that Natalya has survived the detonation. There was lots of scaffolding work while I was here so I had to zoom in close to cut it out. Update: the photo next to that one was taken in 2014.

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We may as well stay with Brosnan-era Bond locations, so lets move on to Vauxhall Cross where 85 Albert Embankment (below), next to Vauxhall Bridge, is the MI6 HQ building in ‘GoldenEye‘ (1995), ‘The World Is Not Enough’ (1999) and ‘Die Another Day’ (2002).

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A 20 minute walk along the river takes you to Westminster Bridge beneath which Bond finds the entrance to the fictitious Vauxhall Cross underground (below). This was used in ‘Die Another Day’ (2002) and is actually nothing more than a caretakers hut.

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The Thames boat chase during the pre-oping credits of ‘The World Is Not Enough’ starts off near Tower Bridge (below).

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It continues on to (and indeed under as only Bond can do) Glengall Bridge in the East End’s docks before moving along Ornamental Canal at Wapping Lane where he soaks a couple of traffic wardens at the right-angle bend pictured below.

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He then crashes through a boatshed at the end of the canal alongside the Tobacco Dock pirate ships (below) and proceeds through a few streets before hitting the water again.  

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He ends up at the Millennium Dome (below), now the O2 Arena, which is a rather poorly scanned photo I took six years ago.

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At 104 Pall Mall (below) is the Reform Club where Bond duels with Gustav Graves in ‘Blades’ in the rather poor ‘Die Another Day’ (2002) and it was also used in ‘Quantum Of Solace’ (2008) as the government office where M is summoned to explain Bonds behaviour.

 

The interior of 92 Stoke Newington Road in the Hackney area (above) is the ‘Cuban’ cigar factory where Bond searches for Zao in the 20th 007 film ‘Die Another Day‘.

In ‘Octopussy’ (1983) the world-famous Sotherby’s auction house (below) on the aptly named Bond Street at number 53 is where Bond cleverly switches the Faberge egg that was put up for sale

 

For Roger Moore’s over-due finale in ‘A View To A Kill’ (1985) the Old War Office Building on Whitehall (above) is the MI6 HQ. Two years later it was Malaysia House (below) at 57 Trafalgar Square which plays the same place for Timothy Dalton’s first outing as the secret agent in ‘The Living Daylights’ (1987).

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George Lazenby only performed the 007 role for one film; ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ (1969) and the College of Arms (below) on Queen Victoria Street is where he learns all about heraldry.

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London made a brief appearance in ‘Quantum Of Solace‘ (2008) when Daniel Craig’s Bond is driven into the entrance of a high rise apartment (below) belonging to a deceased double agent where he and M realise the extent of the mysterious organisation. The flats are called The Water Gardens and they’re on Burwood Place close to Edgware Road tube station.

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Update: The nations capital featured extensively throughout the awesome follow up ‘Skyfall‘ (2012) which you can see in detail here.

For other London filming locations click on the links below:

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace    Trainspotting    Mission: Impossible    Lara Croft Tomb Raider    The Bourne Ultimatum   Harry Potter & The Philosophers Stone   About A Boy    Quadrophenia    Bridget Jones’s Diary    Goodnight Sweetheart    Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels    Basic Instinct 2    Batman Begins/The Dark Knight    The Italian Job    Snatch    Rom-Com Special    Skyfall    Notting Hill    The World Is Not Enough

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In Bruges Filming Locations In Bruges

Due to a bout of heavy snowfall and subsequent Eurostar problems I had to cancel my planned trip to Bruges back in December 2009. I wasn’t gonna let the money I’d spent on a guidebook go to waste though so I took a day trip there back in January when I was over in mainland Europe.

It really was a lovely, picturesque place with its many bridges, canals and medieval buildings. As much as I appreciated that I was there to hunt down the filming locations for the 2008 dark, comedy thriller ‘In Bruges’ featuring Colin Farrell (Ray), Brendan Gleeson (Ken) and Ralph Fiennes (Harry). The former two are Irish hit-men lying low in the Belgian city and they stay at Relais Bourgondisch Cruyce Hotel (Wollestraat 41-47) which took me a while to find and in the end I could only snap it from the other side of the water. You can recognise it behind Ken in the screenshot below.

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The centre-piece of the place is the Belfry and its 366 steps to the top. Like Ken I chose to pay to go up the tower but wish I hadn’t bothered as the view at the top was very restricted with half under repair and the sun shining very brightly through another part. Ray doesn’t go up in the film because he says he can see “the view of down here” from down here. The negative side of me kind of thinks he may have had a point!

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‘t Zwart Huis (the Black House) is the bar where Ray hands a pint of beer to Ken with the not-so politically correct words “One gay beer for my gay friend, one normal beer for me”.

  

Gruthuse was a really beautiful area and appears in the film a couple of times. Its where Ray discovers a movie with ‘midgets’ (his words not mine!) is being made and its also used at the end of ‘In Bruges’ itself.

 

Above is Jerusalem Church on Jerusalemstraat that doubled up as the ‘Basilica of the Holy Blood’ where Ken and the intellectually-challenged Ray go sightseeing with Ray using it as an excuse to get out of the hotel which they’re supposed to be hiding away in.

Beneath the Jan Van Eyck statue is where Ken and Ray have a heart-to-heart chat about people they’ve killed with particular regard to the young boy accidentally killed by Ray.

     

Cafedraal at Zilverstraat 38 is a bar with an awful pun and is where Ray takes Chloe on a date and proceeds to punch a Canadian couple whilst she’s in the toilet.

 

Its not all bad for the pair though as they have a reconciliation outside on the Meetstraat Bridge between Vismarkt and Groenerel.

     

Ken is sent by Harry to get a gun from Yuri who lives at 17 Raamstraat which is in reality Koningstraat. Armed with the gun he then goes to kill Ray (who is feeling suicidal) in Koningin Astridpark where the children’s playground and ornamental pavilion both feature.

             

The photo above is the real bell at the top of the Belfry but as space is very, very limited at the top of the tower Ken’s confrontation with Harry was filmed in the studio. Apart from that, the rest is real with the Marketplace being where Ken plummets and manages to utter a few last gasp words of importance to Ray.

 

The following photos are just some random ones of Bruges which didn’t pop up in the film but are worthy of footnote inclusion in this article.

            

Click here to read ‘Belgium Pt I: Sprout & About In Brussels’

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Belgium 2011: Sprout & About In Brussels

I arrived on Belgian soil for the first time in my life after a ridiculously early flight which left Berlin at 7:10 am. With an evening seat booked on the Eurostar back to London I didn’t have too much time to waste and was happy that I could get a return ticket to Bruges at the airport. To be honest, there wasn’t too much I wanted to see or do in Brussels.

I thought it best to do what I had to do in the capital before Bruges rather than after it when it would probably be dark. First stop had to be the Mannekin Pis; a tiny 61cm high bronze fountain sculpture which was fairly desolate when I arrived but within a couple of minutes a sizeable crowd had gathered round.

   

I then walked on to the UNESCO World Heritage site Grand Place where the view was spoiled in my opinion due to the Christmas tree in the middle of the square. Not only that but it had (I assume) been stripped of all its decorations so it was a bit of a blot on the landscape. The architecture was very impressive, especially the Maison du Roi (or Breadhouse) which can be seen in the second picture below. However, given the time of day it wasn’t exactly a thriving and bustling setting.

   

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London Filming Locations: Harry Potter & The Philosophers Stone (2002)

Only a few days ago did I see ‘Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone‘ (2002) for the first time. I’d never had an interest in this franchise whatsoever but having been to a couple of the London filming locations at the tail end of last year I was intrigued to see those places in the film itself. Of course I do usually only go to places seen in movies which I’ve seen but this was one exception due to its fame and the fact that they were basically right under my nose.

I was with my sister Lorna at Leadenhall Market one evening when we went to see the doorway of ‘The Leaky Cauldron’ which contains the entrance to ‘Diagon Alley’ where Hagrid takes Harry to buy his wizard school supplies. In reality its an optician’s shop (below) at 42 Bulls Head Passage.

A few days after that I was waiting for Richard Richard at St Pancras when I popped over the road to King’s Cross Station. I found Platform 9 3/4 (below) which was actually filmed under the arched wall between platforms 4 and 5.

I didn’t know at that time that there is actually a photo opportunity close to the real platform 9 itself of the ‘platform 9 3/4’ sign with a trolley lodged halfway into the wall to create the effect of it going through the wall en-route to Hogwarts.

I have to say that after I’d seen these two places in the films opening half hour I did lose a bit of interest and failed to follow what was really going on. For the record, the other London locations used were the Reptile House at London Zoo and Australia House’s Exhibition Hall with its marble columns and chandeliers was ‘Gringott’s Bank’.

For other London filming locations click on the links below:

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace    Trainspotting    Mission: Impossible    Lara Croft Tomb Raider    The Bourne Ultimatum   James Bond    About A Boy    Quadrophenia    Bridget Jones’s Diary    Goodnight Sweetheart    Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels    Basic Instinct 2    Batman Begins/The Dark Knight    The Italian Job    Snatch    Rom-Com Special    Skyfall    Notting Hill    The World Is Not Enough

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London Filming Locations: The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)

If twenty plus Bourne Supremacy locations in Berlin wasn’t enough I now present you with a few of the places in London that featured in ‘The Bourne Ultimatum‘ which is probably my favourite Bourne movie. Just over a year ago I went to Tangiers in the north of Morocco which played a major part in the third and final (?) part of the Bourne saga.

On 13 minutes we see a brief overhead shot of the The Guardian HQ at 119 Farringdon Road (below) in Clerkenwell. The rain was falling quite heavily when I was there so I didn’t p*ss about with setting up my tripod to get myself in the photo as is the norm. In fact I was getting so wet that I actually gave up on the location scouting as my flight back to Japan was that same evening and I didn’t want to be sitting on a 12 hour flight with soaking wet jeans. As it was I ended up with wet jeans on the plane anyway as the guy in front of me leaned his seat back so far that he spilled my drink over my leg. As it was I did get 2000 yen in cash from the airline for the inconvenience but I digress.

 

When we see ‘security correspondent’ Simon Ross (Paddy Considine) cross the road on his return to the Guardian offices it’s actually New Garden House (below) at 78-83 Hatton Garden.

      

Two minutes later, he exits his workplace and quickly hails a cab to go and meet Jason Bourne.

  

Meanwhile, assassin Paz is waiting at the Malmaison hotel for orders from Blackbriar’s director Noah Vosen who calls him to go and assassinate Ross who he has been tracking. Malmaison (below) is at 18-21 Charterhouse Square near Smithfield market.

  

Undoubtedly the most famous London location is Waterloo Station (above) which I first went to with my mate Richard Richard just before the end of 2010. Our hero arranges to meet Ross at the south entrance and tries to guide him through the overly-crowded station away from a few hitmen.

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Before entering the station, Bourne directs Ross around the York Road overpass area 18 minutes into the movie. The bus stop is still there although it has had a bit of a facelift since filming took place.

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This series of cleverly constructed events sees the two finally come face to face on 19 mins outside the newsagent stand just outside the south exit. The place is now called Sweet Express but its pretty much the same as briefly seen in the film. Just before that we see Bourne walking over the bridge which takes people from York Road through the Shell Centre building to the station.

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The crew were allowed to film at Waterloo during off-peak hours (i.e. mid-afternoon) so many of the people in the background are just normal people going about their normal lives.

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Bourne surfs the net on 27 minutes using Ross’ notes to find the address of Daniels which he does at a place running parallel to Waterloo Station on Lower Marsh at number 132. It’s called Scootercaffe and, as the name hints, is some sort of cool scooter themed café.

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Pamela Landy (Joan Allen) and Noah Vosen (David Strathaim) have a breakfast meeting on 29 mins at a fancy restaurant in New York City but in reality its the CC Bar at Chancery Court Hotel (below) on 252 High Holborn which is now closed. The real New York locations for ‘Bourne Ultimatum‘ as well as those featured in ‘Bourne Supremacy‘ can be seen here.

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Crescent House on the Golden Lane Estate, Fann Road (below) supposedly features but I really could not find it when playing the DVD back!

You can see my ‘Bourne Supremacy’ Berlin filming locations here.

For other London filming locations click on the links below:

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace    Trainspotting    Mission: Impossible    Lara Croft Tomb Raider    Harry Potter & The Philosophers Stone   James Bond    About A Boy    Quadrophenia    Bridget Jones’s Diary    Goodnight Sweetheart    Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels    Basic Instinct 2    Batman Begins/The Dark Knight    The Italian Job    Snatch    Rom-Com Special    Skyfall    Notting Hill    The World Is Not Enough

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Berlin Filming Locations: The Bourne Supremacy (2004)

The second film in the Bourne trilogy begins in Goa (India) where Bourne (Matt Damon) and Marie (Franka Potente) are lying low. After that its mostly Berlin all the way albeit in a variety of guises as the German capital fills in for Naples, Munich, Amsterdam and Moscow.

Berlin makes its first appearance on 6 mins in The Bourne Supremacyby way of the Kantstrasse/Hardenbergstrasse junction next to Zoologischer Garten Station (below) which is where a deal is struck to expose the mole within the CIA but Russian agent Kirill sabotages it as he tries to frame Jason Bourne.

 

Kirill reports to Yuri (his control) at Motel Avus (below) at 51 Halenseestrasse.

  

Over the road from that is the ICC at Messedamm and the parking area beneath that doubles up as ‘Moscow’ Airport where they meet each other after 19 mins.

 

Nearby, at the northern entrance to the Berlin Exhibition Grounds at Messedamm 22 is the ‘Naples’ custom office where Bourne is held on his return to Europe

 

Next up on 35 mins is ‘Amsterdam’ but of course its Berlin and Walter-Benjamin-Platz in particular where Nicky (Julia Stiles) is found by Ward Abbott.

 

Bourne arrives in the German capital at Berlin Oestbahnhof (below) on 45 mins and walks past a souvenir shop inside the station.

     

He then puts his bag into the exact same locker pictured below in exchange for another bag he’d been keeping in there.

 

Its in this station that he phones a few hotels in the name of tracking down US agent Pamela Landy (Joan Allen). Before he tails her, he crosses the Oberbaumbruecke (below) on 46 mins which featured prominantly inRun Lola Runfeaturing his co-star Franka Potente as can be seen in ‘Berlin Pt II’.

 

The Westin Grand (below) is the luxury hotel where Landy is staying.

  

Bourne cleverly finds out at reception on 46 mins that she is staying in room 235.

      

He then watches her leave from his position on the 4th floor and then takes the stairs down and goes through the hotels revolving doors where he gets in a taxi and follows her to the CIA hub where he makes a phonecall to her whilst watching from a nearby rooftop.

        

Alexanderplatz (below) plays host to the next round of events in the movie after 53 mins. Bourne arranges to meet Nicky under the Weltzeituhr (world clock) on Alexanderstrasse amid a student demonstration.

     

The next location is over in West Berlin at Hotel Brecker (at Kurfurstendamm 288) where Bourne has flashbacks of his disastrous first mission to kill Russian politician Neski in room 645. I knew the hotel didn’t exist but wanted to find the building but, after a long walk, all I found was a pile of rubble as the place had been demolished.

 

Friedrichstrasse station provides some of the films most exciting scenes on 69 mins (in a movie jam-packed with action) when the police chase Bourne up some steps, over the bridge and on to the platform. Unlike most other films the train doors don’t magically close as soon as he gets on but he does use efficient German timing to his advantage in order to make his escape. He jumps across the track seen below narrowly avoiding an oncoming train and then he hops on over the bridge onto a slow riverboat, hooks himself back on to the brdige and hauls himself up and gets back on the train he’d originally intended to take. Classic!

            

After this, Bourne takes the train to Moscow on 81 mins. The ‘Moscow’ disco, where Yuri finds Kirill and informs his that Bourne is still alive, is of course in Berlin. It’s the aptly named Cafe Moskau on Karl Marx Allee 34 although we don’t see the front of it in the movie. Instead, the Kino International complex across the road is seen from under the cafe on 81 mins.

 

The ‘Moscow’ street where Bourne arrives by taxi on 83 mins in search of Neski’s daughter is actually Scharrenstrasse (below) near Spittelmarkt U-Bahn station.

  

On foot he turns into Friedrichsgracht (below).

 

He walks under a bridge and is shot by Kirill next to the river below which was frozen over when I was there. Kirill is temporarily arrested before a car chase ensues.

 

As well as actual Moscow this car chase was also filmed in Berlin with perhaps the most notable part being the final crash at the Potsdamer Platz exit of Tiergarten Tunnel (below) on 93 mins.

 

You can see my Bourne Identity & Bourne Ultimatum location photos here & here.

Click here to see the London filming locations for ‘Jason Bourne (2016)’ 

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Berlin Filming Locations: Lola Rennt (Run Lola Run) (1998)

If you were to ask me what my favourite German film was I’d have to go for ‘Lola Rennt‘ (UK title: ‘Run Lola Run‘) due to the fact that it’s probably the only one I have ever seen!

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Other than that, it’s actually a very good film using the streets of Berlin in a clever edit which makes it seem as if all the locations are near each other. That’s far from the case though as it took me a couple of days to get round them all unlike the flame-haired Lola (Franka Potente) herself who has to run it in 20 minutes……..three times!

When she gets the all important call from boyfriend Manni during the movies opening moments she rushes out of her apartment, down the stairwell and out of the apartment block at 13-14 Albrechtstrasse (below) near Friedrichstrasse railway station. This was my first port of call and maybe the most important one and I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was so accessible as I thought I’d probably just have to poke my camera through the gates railings.

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The phone box (below) specifically erected in front of the Apotheke (drug store) for the movie was on the corner of Osnabruecker Strasse and Tauroggener Strasse.

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Below is the Deutsche Transfer Bank which is located at Behrenstrasse 37. It’s a hotel now and stood in as a fictitious bank.

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Oberbaumbruecke (below) is the train overpass which features just before Lola dashes through its turrets and picturesque brick arcades.

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The casino’s exterior (below) is on Unter Den Linden opposite the Deutsches Historisches Museum.

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In front of this museum (below) on the corner of Hinter Dem Giesshaus is where Lola runs in front of a lorry.

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Just after Strausberger Platz on Karl Marx Allee is where Lola wishes for Manni to arrive. The fernsehturm (TV Tower) is obscured by the trees in the film and it’s the cloud which hides it in my photo (below) although if you look hard enough you can just about see it above my left shoulder.

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The square tile pattern pavement Lola runs across is Gendarmenmarkt (below) and its Konzerthaus features but all of this was under construction when I was there or it might just have been that it had been used for a New Years Party a few days prior to my arrival. Across the road from there is the shop underpassage. This is on the corner of Charlottenstrasse and Franzoesische Strasse and is where Lola runs in Run 1 of the film.

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23-24 Wallstrasse (below) features in all three runs and is where Herr Meier comes out of his garage. Its not really recognisable now in any way as its now a hotel.

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Cuvrystrasse (below) is where Lola gets shot at the end of the first run.

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Franzoesische Strasse U-Bahn station (below) is the station which is in the middle of the road and the path that Lola runs is slightly different on the three takes during the film before she encounters the Nuns.

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Those Nuns appeared on Mauerstrasse (below) in all three runs with very slight variations as Lola runs through them. The cyclist appears from Franzoesische Strasse which is just round the corner and slightly further south from the nuns. Sadly these two photos were taken at night (I hadn’t originally deemed them important enough to bother with them but decided that I might as well complete things at the end of a long busy day) so they are not so clear.

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Click here to see the Berlin filming locations for ‘The Bourne Supremacy‘ (2004) 

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Berlin 2011: Meine Zwei Nächte In Berlin

After two nights in Prague I took an early morning 4.5 hour train ride to Berlin Hauptbahnhof which I arrived at just after 11am on January 3rd. It took me a while to get my bearings which was down to my guidebook being old and having a different name for the main station which I was at. Once I’d asked where I was on the train map I headed straight out on foot across the road and within moments found myself at Reichstag.

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The place was covered in snow and ice which added to the beauty of the place for me as my image of Berlin is as a cold place. What wasn’t so nice was the mess of the place from the New Years party with fireworks and glass bottles lying all around which was a surprise as I thought the Germans were supposed to be efficient! Moments later I was at the Brandenburger Tor which is perhaps the most iconic landmark in Berlin and a place I visited with friends back in the Summer of 2003 when I was working and living in Hamburg. Apart from this place I didn’t remember too much else about the city or what exactly we did when we were there.

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A good thing about travelling very light (just a small backpack) is that you don’t need to go to your accommodation on arrival to dump your bags. With that n mind I moved on to the next landmark which was the Berliner Dom with the Alexanderplatz Fernsehturm lingering in the background. What I love about Berlin is that the main sights are all within reasonably close walking distance along Unter Den Linden (Berlin’s equivalent of the Champs Elysees in Paris) and just beyond that. The city has a good mix of culture, sights, architecture and of course its history.

I arrived at Checkpoint Charlie just as daylight was disappearing and I was rather annoyed that a huge Christmas tree had been erected right next to the guard house. Unlike 2003 I actually coughed up the $12 fee to go into the Hause am Checkpoint Charlie museum which was fascinating with photos and exhibits relating to escape attempts from the Eastern side using hot-air balloons, getaway cars, chairlifts, and even a mini-U-Boat.

   

It had been a very long day though and I soon got tired (as I always do in museums which is why I don’t often go to them) and ripped round the remainder of what I hadn’t seen. Below are some random photos taken the following day showing the conditions of the city.

     

‘Berlin Pt II: Lola Rennt (Run Lola Run) Filming Locations’ can be seen here.

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London Filming Locations: Lara Croft Tomb Raider (2001)

It certainly won’t be remembered as a classic film but ‘Lara Croft: Tomb Raider’ (2001) will be remembered. One reason is of course down to Angelina Jolie’s great portrayal of the video game heroine and another is the plot, it’s depth and the character development! Naturally, I am joking about the latter. Maybe one other reason it is remembered is because of the Continue reading

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