I remember watching The Long Good Friday
for the first time very well. For one
thing, it was the first time my husband and I sat down to watch a film together
in the early days of our relationship.
The other thing that makes it stand out in my memory is the fiery
portrayal of the film's main character, the gangster Harold Shand, by one of Britain's best-loved actors, Bob Hoskins, who sadly died of pneumonia last week aged 71. In the film, which dates from the early days
of Thatcherism, Shand (whose girlfriend is played by a youthful Helen Mirren) has a plan to develop the London Docklands into a future
Olympics venue (long before this became a reality) with the backing of American Mafia money, but his plans rapidly
descend into chaos over an Easter weekend with a series of murders and
explosions which, it later transpires, are the work of the IRA: one of Shand's
associates got on the wrong side of them in a previous event resulting in
several IRA deaths.
As for the film's locations, it is
fascinating when watching the film now to see certain parts of London which have since changed beyond
recognition. When Shand tours the site
of his proposed development in the Canary
Wharf area, we see the
location of what was to become One
Canada Square, a skyscraper completed in
1991. The building, designed by
architect Cesar Pelli, was the tallest building in the UK from 1990 to
2010, and is primarily used for retail and offices. Another scene in the film was shot at the
Harringay Stadium, best known for greyhound racing and motorcycle
speedway. The stadium closed in 1987 and
- a sign of our retail-obsessed times - has been turned into a superstore. At one point in the film Shand has a meeting
at the King George V Dock in the Royal Docks.
This has also completely changed use, and is now the site of London City Airport.
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| Masters of the Universe - geograph.org.uk - 1495606. Photo by Mike Quinn, via Wikimedia Commons. |
No film shot in London would be complete without a sprinkling
of pubs, real or purpose-built. The
Governor General pub depicted in the film was the actual name of this pub in
Downham, south-east London,
at the time of filming, but the pub is now gone, replaced by a Q8 petrol
station. The pub in the film which is
supposedly Fagan's in Belfast, is actually The Salisbury Hotel in Green
Lanes, Harringay. As for the Lion and
Unicorn pub, this is a complete fabrication made for the film in Wapping -
just as well because it is the scene of one of the explosions. The film-makers must have made a good job of it, because allegedly people kept
knocking on the door during filming to find out when the pub was going to open. Another explosion occurs when Shand's Rolls
Royce is blown up in a churchyard, killing the chauffeur. This scene was filmed at St George in the East, a striking church built in the early 18th century and located in Stepney, just to the
north of St Katharine Docks. This
Anglican Church was the scene of an earlier real-life explosion when it was bombed during
the Blitz, but it was rebuilt and is still a functioning church. The interior church scenes were filmed in St Patrick's Church, a Roman Catholic church in Wapping. One of London's
most famous hotels, The Savoy, also puts in an appearance towards the end, when
Shand has a meeting with his mafia buddies.
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| St George in the East 01. Photo by Steve Cadman, via Wikimedia Commons. |
So, if you want to have a nostalgic look at
the London of the end of the 70s/early 80s, why not pay your respects to the
late Bob Hoskins by watching, or rewatching, what many consider to have been
his best cinematic performance.
