[net.railroad] Seeing movies shot where you live

msb@lsuc.UUCP (Mark Brader) (02/05/85)

bjf@utcs.UUCP (Bruce Freeman) writes in net.movies (edited to remove spoiler):

> ... I remember that when I saw SILVER STREAK that
> it was amusing to see the train leave Toronto ("Los Angeles") at the beginning
> of the movie and then arrive at Toronto's Union Station ("Chicago")...

Actually, it was better than that.  The opening shots around the
station really were Los Angeles.  But when the train pulled out of
the station, it was leaving Toronto's Union Station going east.
The Toronto skyline is quite different from LA's!

After that, Toronto's station doubled not only for Chicago as
stated, but also for Kansas City!  (KC was downstairs, Chicago
upstairs plus the tracks west of the station.)

Mark Brader
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cb@hlwpc.UUCP (Carl Blesch) (02/05/85)

Yes, the "Chicago station" in Silver Streak was Toronto,
but the tracks that the Silver Streak arrived on were really
in Chicago -- at the Chicago and North Western Station.
As the train is barreling into the station at however-many-miles-an-hour,
you can see the bridge for the Lake Street El overhead and the
pedestrian tunnel to the Lake St. El, dubbed the "Northwest Passage,"
on your right.

It's also interesting to note that the same station was used in
the movie, "Continental Divide."  Blair Brown and John Belushi
(may he rest in peace!) got on the Empire Builder at North Western
Station.  The Builder really leaves two blocks down the road at
Union Station, as do all Amtrak trains, but I can accept that 
poetic license.  The grevious error is that they were
taking the Empire Builder to Wyoming!  If that was the case,
shouldn't their train have been named the San Francisco Zephyr?

Carl Blesch