What do Jeremy Renner fans do when not watching their hero? Well, they re-enact parts of his films in their actual real life locations, and they lunge of course...
Anyone who read my Geek La Chic articles back in April will already know that I am not only a huge Jeremy Renner fan, but I have also met a great many of my best and most treasured friends through his fandom. What an amazing bunch of people he has as his fans. I hope he realises.
After we collectively went to see Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation in July (review here) we decided that our next outing should be to hunt down some of the London locations used in the shoot of the movie.
One of my Renner friends Sammy actually tweeted the director Chris McQuarrie to find out which train station they filmed in towards the end of the movie. He returned her tweet telling her it wasn't actually a station, and if we found it he'd send her a poster. Sadly we didn't manage to find the building with the red tiles but we did find a whole bunch of other locations and did what any discerning fanwoman would do, we took pictures of each other re-enacting moments from the movie. If that doesn't earn us all posters then I don't know what will.
Our first location was actually one of the first parts of the movie (after the plane take off), when Agent Hunt goes to get his mission in a London Record Shop...
Next up we found the theater that Agent Hunt stood in front of to take a phone call from the IMF.
Suze was our Agent Hunt stand in for this shot as she was the only one who would brave going into the stinky London telephone box.
Our next mission was to find the "station" in the movie. We had been informed this was King's Cross but it seems now that most of this scene was shot somewhere else. Back to the drawing board. In the mean time Ims did get this shot of me pretending to be the smirky Agent Brandt, my newspaper in hand and lean perfected.
Ims also photographed me as Benji and Luther in the same part of the film.
We were pooped after our day out in London and called it a day after this so that we could re-fuel, sleep and prepare ourselves for mission day 2.
Our first location on day 2 was a lane passing the Royal Courts of Justice, down which Ethan Hunt and Ilsa Faust flee while escaping from Soloman Lane. Here I captured Ims and Suze re-enacting the scene beautifully.
Next we headed to Middle Temple to look for the arches where Ilsa and Vinter have a particularly atmospheric knife fight. In the process we found the steps where Ethan Hunt runs down in the dark, gets into the building and jumps out of the window on the right to fell his opponent. We were all inordinately pleased to find that the shrub is real.
The arches where Ims and Suze re-enacted the knife fight using Biro's.
Whilst heading to our next location (and getting lost within Middle Temple) we discovered another two locations we hadn't even been looking for, the first one was outside Middle Temple Hall. Here I re-enact Ilsa running. She's much fitter than I obviously.
The second was this tunnel where our hero and heroine of the hour are being chased by the bad guys! Here I think Suze is being all of the characters in the scene simultaneously. :)
Our next planned location was The Tower of London/Tower Bridge, the dockside of which was used in the very tense scene where Agent Hunt meets with Ilsa and her hostage Benji.
We also assumed that the building Soloman Lane looks out of was one of these across from Tower Bridge.
Our final location was St John Street, looking towards Smithfield Market. The spot where Agent Brandt "betrays" his colleagues in a classic red phone box, which unfortunately was a prop. Hence I, as Brandt, made the call in the street instead.
After making the fateful telephone call where he effectively sold out his friends, Agent Brandt trudges despondently down the street.
We also found the location of this warehouse scene, although could not go inside to take a picture.
We ended our day with a signature Renner Lunge (Patent Pending I'm sure) to ease out any aches from all that walking around London.
I hope you enjoyed the tour, and maybe we've helped you to source some locations you might have been looking for. If anyone reading this does happen to know where the King's Cross scenes were filmed (somewhere with a main hall that's very big, and in London) please do get in touch.
Massive thank you to Ims, Suze and Sammy for the use of their photos and helpful information. Screenshots courtesy of Google Images and Paramount Pictures.
Anyone who read my Geek La Chic articles back in April will already know that I am not only a huge Jeremy Renner fan, but I have also met a great many of my best and most treasured friends through his fandom. What an amazing bunch of people he has as his fans. I hope he realises.
After we collectively went to see Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation in July (review here) we decided that our next outing should be to hunt down some of the London locations used in the shoot of the movie.
One of my Renner friends Sammy actually tweeted the director Chris McQuarrie to find out which train station they filmed in towards the end of the movie. He returned her tweet telling her it wasn't actually a station, and if we found it he'd send her a poster. Sadly we didn't manage to find the building with the red tiles but we did find a whole bunch of other locations and did what any discerning fanwoman would do, we took pictures of each other re-enacting moments from the movie. If that doesn't earn us all posters then I don't know what will.
Our first location was actually one of the first parts of the movie (after the plane take off), when Agent Hunt goes to get his mission in a London Record Shop...
Our next mission was to find the "station" in the movie. We had been informed this was King's Cross but it seems now that most of this scene was shot somewhere else. Back to the drawing board. In the mean time Ims did get this shot of me pretending to be the smirky Agent Brandt, my newspaper in hand and lean perfected.
Our first location on day 2 was a lane passing the Royal Courts of Justice, down which Ethan Hunt and Ilsa Faust flee while escaping from Soloman Lane. Here I captured Ims and Suze re-enacting the scene beautifully.
Next we headed to Middle Temple to look for the arches where Ilsa and Vinter have a particularly atmospheric knife fight. In the process we found the steps where Ethan Hunt runs down in the dark, gets into the building and jumps out of the window on the right to fell his opponent. We were all inordinately pleased to find that the shrub is real.
The arches where Ims and Suze re-enacted the knife fight using Biro's.
The second was this tunnel where our hero and heroine of the hour are being chased by the bad guys! Here I think Suze is being all of the characters in the scene simultaneously. :)
Our next planned location was The Tower of London/Tower Bridge, the dockside of which was used in the very tense scene where Agent Hunt meets with Ilsa and her hostage Benji.
Our final location was St John Street, looking towards Smithfield Market. The spot where Agent Brandt "betrays" his colleagues in a classic red phone box, which unfortunately was a prop. Hence I, as Brandt, made the call in the street instead.
We also found the location of this warehouse scene, although could not go inside to take a picture.
We ended our day with a signature Renner Lunge (Patent Pending I'm sure) to ease out any aches from all that walking around London.
I hope you enjoyed the tour, and maybe we've helped you to source some locations you might have been looking for. If anyone reading this does happen to know where the King's Cross scenes were filmed (somewhere with a main hall that's very big, and in London) please do get in touch.
Massive thank you to Ims, Suze and Sammy for the use of their photos and helpful information. Screenshots courtesy of Google Images and Paramount Pictures.
