Trip Coach: December 12, 2006

Pinnacle, NC: In "Casino Royale," is the villa in the last scene on Lake Como? Very breathtaking. Is it privatly owned? If not, do they rent rooms?

Tony Reeves: Mr White's villa at the end of the movie is Villa La Gaeta at San Siro, on the west coast of Lake Como. I don't think it's a hotel, but there are several in the vicinity. Incidentally, the 'hospital' where Bond recovers is another lake Como villa, about 10 miles to the south near Lenno. It's Villa Balbianello, which was also the Lake Retreat for Annakin and padme in Attack of the Clones, and one of the most breathtaking locations I've visited. You might also bump into George Clooney in the local supermarket, as his villa is not too far away!

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Oakland, CA: What is the location of "Everything is Illuminated," the film about Trachimbrod by Liev Schrieber?

Tony Reeves: It's set in the Ukraine but the film, like so many these days, was made around Prague in the Czech Republic.

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Miami, FL: Could you tell me anyting about the locations of the sweeping landscapes seen in "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," "Hero," and "House of Flying Daggers"? Thanks!

Tony Reeves: The Crouching Tiger desertscapes are the Gobi Desert in Xinjiang Province. The bamboo forest in Zhejiang Province, southern China. The stately home and courtyard were a set at the Beijing Stdios.
For Hero, the attack on the calligraphy chool was filmed at Dangjin Mountain in Akesai, near old Dunhuang City, in northwest China, toward Mongolia. The amazing, wind-blasted rock formations, called 'yadan' are here too. The sword fight above the lake is at Jiu Zhai Gou ('Nine Villages Valley'), a popular tourist destination about 12 hours by bus from Chengdu. The lake itself is Jian ZhuHai ('Cold bamboo Sea'). Just to the south, where two valleys merge into Shuzheng Gully, you can see the waterfall, at which Broken Sword and Flying Snow meet in the 'green' sequence. It's the 98-feet-high Nuorilang Falls ('nuorilang' is "magnificent and splendid" in the Tibetan language). More scenes filmed at the yellow grassy marshland near another lake, Chang Hai (Long Sea).
The elegaic fight between Flying Snow (Maggie Cheung) and Moon (Zhang Ziyi) among fluttering autumnal leaves, is an ancient oak grove in Inner Mongolia. Timing was everything: an employee, stationed out in Mongolia, called the director the moment the leaves turned a perfect shade of gold.
Most of the House of Flying Daggers was shot near Lviv, western Ukraine, a location previously used for Jackie Chan's First Strike. Sets were built at Yongchuan, Sichun Province, in the bamboo forests of Tea Mountain and Bamboo Sea Scenery Park, near the city of Chongqing. To visit China's 120-square km park, the largest primaeval bamboo park in the country, you take a two-hour flight from Shanghai to Chengdu, from where there's a bus trip (approximately five hours) to the Bamboo Sea. There's the unique Bamboo Museum, and and a bamboo restaurant featuring dishes based on the local speciality. Interiors, including the 'Peony Pavilion' and the abandoned Buddhist temple in the bamboo forest, lensed in Beijing Film Studio (where films such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Kill Bill [qv] were previously filmed).

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Tony Reeves: Well, thanks for those questions. I hope they helped your travel plans. This is Tony Reeves, author of The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations, signing off.

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