Vancouver – Hollywood’s favorite place
This article is part of the FT Globetrotter report Guide to Vancouver
Where would movies be without Vancouver? They call it Hollywood North for a reason: The city is a tireless servant of cinema, home to a host of sound stages and special effects houses, most famously the giant North Shore Studios. It all goes into making our multiplayer entertainment. The ace in the city’s film industry? Sharing the same time zone with Los Angeles.
But Vancouver is not just an off-screen cog, but vital to the smooth running of the Hollywood machine. On camera, it has served as a frequent backdrop for the studio’s blockbuster films, though it has rarely been credited as an actual location: glimpses of Gastown and the Lion’s Gate Bridge have been a feature of Marvel films, twilight Science fiction movies and stories from Planet of the Apes New edition of I am a robot, and a list of titles that could easily occupy the rest of this piece. (The next season of the TV series The last of us It will be the latest project to offer a chance to see the city’s sights, albeit through a sad post-apocalyptic lens.)
Sometimes the role may be a general view of the city. Sometimes, overt sleight of hand is used, playing another city as an urban double, a stand-in for New York or Washington, D.C., or even — in the case of Seth Rogen’s comedy — New York City. the interview – The capital of North Korea, Pyongyang.
But of course, the city also has its own flavour, too, and what follows is a brief but impressive guide to the best films in which Vancouver steps out from the shadow of other cities – and earns the focus for itself.
“Deadpool” (Tim Miller, 2016)
The only exception to the self-imposed rule whereby Vancouver is called that on screen is comic book fun dead pool It makes up for the sheer depth of its connection to the city. To the untrained eye, the landscape through which superhero Ryan Reynolds wreaks havoc may look a lot like New York. But for anyone who knows British Columbia, where we are will be clear.
The entire film plays like a slideshow of Vancouver landmarks, from the Georgia Bridge to Leeside Skatepark; From Chinatown to PNE Agrodome. The clincher, of course, is the star presence of born-and-raised city product Ryan Reynolds: a Kitsilano High School student, and a bona fide bag-packing graduate at the Safeway supermarket on West King Edward Street.
Where to watch the movie Deadpool: Disney+, Camel, Amazon Prime And Google Apps
“Bitter Ashes” (Larry Kent, 1963)
if dead pool Puts Vancouver at the heart of multiplex fun, Bitter ash It makes the city the setting for a slice of raw bohemian reality to the point that director Larry Kent had to screen it in person at Canadian universities in the 1960s, unable to secure more mainstream distribution. After fleeing apartheid South Africa, Kent finds his adopted home inspiring a stark study of youth, with a touch of… Rebellion without a cause And Long distance runner unit.
It will take some time before the city itself is ready to see it. But Canada and the world beyond will eventually catch up. Early admirers included Jack Nicholson, while the great Canadian maverick David Cronenberg later spoke warmly of Kent’s formative influence on him. By 2012, the Toronto Film Festival was honoring Kent with a celebratory screening of his film Bitter ashnow beautifully restored.
Where to watch the movie “Bitter Ashes”: DVD
“That Cold Day in the Park” (Robert Altman, 1969)
Legendary director Robert Altman was often specific about the city in which he chose to tell stories. Consider Los Angeles, the site of his latest masterpiece. Short cuts – Or those previous American classics, nashville. Less well-known but equally important in Altman’s long career That cold day in the parkFilmed and set in Vancouver, it is filled with the most vivid psychological horror Altman has ever delivered.
It is the turbulent tale of a lonely adult woman and a taciturn teenage boy, with a hint of… Rosemary’s baby Suspended in the air — but on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, the location is an apartment building next to Kitsilano’s Tatlow Park. The film was received coldly at the time, but was later re-evaluated. Altman returned to Vancouver for the tributes McCabe and Mrs. Miller, Even if this time the city is more disguised as 20th century Washington state.
Where to watch “That Cold Day in the Park”: Amazon Prime, Google Apps And DVD/Blu-ray
“The body remembers when the world opened up” (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers and Kathleen Hepburn, 2019)
Despite Vancouver’s close relationship with Hollywood, there’s an independent spirit alive in the city’s cinema as well. That ferocious energy he exudes The body remembers when the world opened upa modern social realist thriller co-directed by Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers and Kathleen Hepburn, and distributed by Ava DuVernay’s Array.
Creatively, the film is irresistibly daring, shot to look like it was shot in one continuous shot. The story is equally compelling, the tale of two indigenous women (one played by Tailfeathers) from opposite ends of the class spectrum, whose paths collide as strangers before one helps the other escape a violent ex-boyfriend. The film resembles a Hitchcockian feminist spectacle, shot in rainy East Vancouver and in which he quickly became a third co-star.
Not currently streaming or on DVD
‘Zero hour!’ (Hal Bartlett, 1957)
A hidden nugget of film history, an airborne melodrama Zero hour! The film turns the later Hollywood script on its head by being set in Vancouver, but was actually filmed in California. However, much of the film is supposed to take place above ground, on a flight into the city from Winnipeg that threatens to become the scene of disaster.
The reason is that food was served on the plane, leaving both the pilot and co-pilot sick with food poisoning. Thank God there was a pilot among the passengers, even if he had never flown a commercial flight, and was still reeling from his wartime experiences. However, our hero now bravely steps into the cockpit to save the day – with the help of only his wartime captain, now on the ground with a radio in hand at the Vancouver airport. If a lot of this sounds strangely familiar, there’s a reason. The entire premise of the film would later be revived and spoofed to death as a blueprint for the delightful high comedy of airplane!
Where to watch “Zero Hour!”: Amazon Prime
“Meditation Garden” (Mina Shum, 2017)
If the story of Vancouver and cinema is tied to the union between Canada and the American film industry, it is a thin drama Meditation garden Explores another long international connection: the history of migration to the city by Hong Kong residents. At the heart of the film is Maria Wang (played by veteran Chinese actress Bai Bei Cheng), a stay-at-home grandmother whose orderly life is turned upside down when she learns that her husband is having an affair.
Amid the fallout, she finds camaraderie with a new group of girlfriends and solace in her adopted city. The cast includes Canadian treasures Sandra Oh and Don McKellar, but Vancouver itself plays a star role as well, most notably the bustling streets of Hastings-Sunrise, which director Minna Shum calls home.
Not currently streaming or on DVD
The Bear (Jean-Jacques Annaud, 1988)
A stickler might say we’ve outgrown our remit by moving from Vancouver to the broader British Columbia scene The bear, the lyrical, realistic portrait — which stands on the cusp between drama and documentary — of a young cub growing into adulthood. (The same pedant will complain even more when he learns that the film was actually shot in the Alps.) But the movie remains on the list. The connection to Canada was the stuff of literary history: Jean-Jacques Annaud’s directorial work from the 1916 novel King Grizzly, placed by its author James Oliver Curwood specifically in British Columbia. And what image can Vancouver really get away from the broader nature of the city – the vast, timeless wilderness just beyond?
Where to watch “The Bear”: Amazon Prime
What movies set in Vancouver would you recommend? Tell us in the comments below. And follow the FT Globetrotter on Instagram at @FTGlobetrotter
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