One of the most amusing things I’ve found in Tony Reeves’ book Movie London is the way London pops up in many films as… somewhere completely different!
Quite often, London becomes Russia. Well, I can see the point of that when in The Music Lovers St Sofia’s Orthodox Cathedral in Bayswater is used as the church where Tchaikovsky’s wedding is held. Appropriately, the cathedral is in Moscow Road! It also figures as a St Petersburg church in the Bond film Goldeneye.
Other Russian locations include Drapers Hall, Throgmorton Street, which becomes St Petersburg in Goldeneye and the Moscow headquarters of Tretiak Oil & Gas Industries in The Saint. I used to walk past Draper’s Hall every day on my way to work, and I never thought it looked particularly Russian - but then I’m not a film director.
Lancaster House becomes the Winter Palace in St Petersburg in Reds, and the Gloucester Avenue bridge becomes Moscow in The music lovers - it’s where Tchaikovsky tries to commit suicide by throwing himself in the canal. In Reds again, the Central Hall Westminster becomes the St Petersburg Post Office.
In the 2004 remake of Alfie, Canary Wharf stands in for New York. (By the way, if you’re going to see Alfie, make it the original film with Michael Caine and a real Swinging Sixties feel - the remake is a very flabby piece by comparison.)
Even more outrageously, London becomes Istanbul in Murder on the Orient Express. The Finsbury Park Astoria’s fine Moorish style foyer is used for an interior shot.
Perhaps the most outlandish destination that a London building has ever become is Vietnam. In Full Metal Jacket, Beckton Gasworks stands in for Indochina.
Of course, occasionally you see somewhere else standing in for London. For instance, though there’s a genuine London establishing shot at the start of Mira Nair’s Vanity Fair - you can see the spire of Christ Church Spitalfields in the background - all the rest of the ‘London’ scenes were shot in Bath.
And to my great surprise, some of what I’ve always thought were the most iconic images of London in film were actually fakes. The drive down Whitehall in Austin Powers was all done by back projection, and the Law Courts in Hitchcock’s Sabotage were just a big photographic blow-up. Oh well, there goes another illusion…
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