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Thread: Looking for a movie location...

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    Default Looking for a movie location...

    From the movie "Midnite Spares", which was filmed entirely in Sydney in early 1982, does anyone know where (or even what) this place is...



    ..the posters on the gate are for the Silver Spade Room in the Old Chevron Hotel at Potts Point, and seeing as the movie was supposed to be based in Western Sydney I doubt they would be fake (otherwise they would've picked a location out west)...



    ..at first I thought it may have been the dry dock at Garden Island but it doesn't look like the right shape on Google, plus there are buildings all around, not ocean...



    ..and then I thought it may have been the old sunken reservoir at Paddington (which has since been converted into a "sunken garden"), but that's full of masonry arches and such so that doesn't seem right either.

    I'd reckon the tall building with the three slit windows may be a pump-house... but where?



Look Here ->
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    Production company: Wednesday Investments Pty Ltd and Filmco Ltd.
    Budget: $2.6 million (Murray's Australian Film)
    Locations: Sydney - the exterior for the area in which the T and T Towing workshop was set was in (a now much changed) Macdonald Street, Erskineville (Erko) in Sydney's inner west (the entrance and interiors were a cheat in another location); speedway racing was done at Granville (aka Parramatta) raceway; the main hero houses were situated in Monterey Parade Ermington, while a stunt crash in the rain in city streets was filmed at the corner of Kippax and Waterloo street, Surry Hills (The business E J Dwyer Pty Ltd, a supplier of missal and prayer texts, still in business in November 2014, can be seen in the background). Other business signs provide clues regarding locations - for example, Casula Auto Wreckers. According to the film's Facebook page , the takeway used for Grubb's Grub was at Homebush (but has since fallen on hard times), while the Holden dealership that's featured was in Parramatta at the corner of Church street and the Great Western Highway

    ....keep digging, it's like a treasure hunt =)
    Last edited by wotnot; 03-12-22 at 10:22 PM.

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    think it was the old brickworks
    dont say linux if i wanted it id install it

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    Thanks @wotnot, yep I had already seen that info on .

    Quote Originally Posted by fandtm666 View Post
    think it was the old brickworks
    Thanks @fandtm666, assuming you mean the old brickworks at St.Peters (now Sydney Park), that would tie-in with another filming location used in Alexandria, but I've been searching old photos and can't find anything I recognise from the movie.

    Watching the clip again, I don't see anything landmark-wise in the skyline either, notably no brickworks chimneys, and I would've thought you could see the CBD from there (unless it just happens to be facing the other direction), as Centrepoint Tower had just been completed the previous year.
    Last edited by Bigfella237; 04-12-22 at 11:44 AM.

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    Got it .... Sydenham Stormwater Basin



    Last edited by wotnot; 04-12-22 at 02:39 PM.

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    How did I miss that?! It was right next to where I was looking on the map.

    Thanks wotnot!

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    It was eating at me, dredging through memories 50+ years old ~ I knew I'd see it before as a kid, it stood out to me because of the stone work, there was another of these pits years ago nearby, but it was all bricked.

    This morning I remembered I'd seen it from a train, but it wasn't often I traveled down the Sydenham line =)

    So much has changed....I always remember that part of town, St Peters, Tempe.....everything covered with and smelling of coal dust or diesel soot...sigh, seems sooo long ago now 8)

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    yep was a good old movie like running on empty, especially the old blind
    fella driving that chev.



    i seen alot of those cars being built by some fellas i knew down in vally.


    Last edited by fandtm666; 04-12-22 at 04:12 PM.
    dont say linux if i wanted it id install it

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    Another location from the same movie, possibly for the Magpies fans this time...

    Can anyone confirm that this is the old Western Suburbs Leagues Club circa 1982...



    ..and if so, where exactly it was? The street sign in this frame says "Elizabeth St" (I think)...



    ...and I know the present club is on the corner of Elizabeth Street and Liverpool Road, Ashfield, but that intersection doesn't look like the above.

    Was the club ever somewhere else?
    Last edited by Bigfella237; 04-12-22 at 05:03 PM.

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    Now that I look a bit harder, it may also be the NSW Leagues Club cnr Phillip Street & Elizabeth Street, Redfern?

    But there's no building there that looks like that, maybe it was demolished and turned into "Redfern Park"?

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    Found another filming location, although it's looking a bit sad 40 years later. From the movie...



    Casula Wreckers itself appears to be gone altogether, but the building that housed the auto parts store next door is still there...



    Next up I'm looking for the location of "Panton's", does "Holly's Place Quality Used Vehicles" mean anything to anyone?



    It also appears to be across the road from "Millard Australia"...



    ..but I'd guess it may just be a caravan dealer? And there appears to be a Golden Fleece servo next door as well.

    The phone number on the green building looks like it starts with 760 (9760 in today's terms) and apparently that's a Parramatta area prefix?

    Even if I could narrow it down to a suburb I can search street by street. Does anything above ring any bells?

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    Any chance that this is the old Rooty Hill RSL...



    ..was it ever on the corner of Sherbrooke & Elizabeth Streets, Rooty Hill? (There is nothing there now but residential housing, but it is just down the street from the club's current location.)

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