Backdraft is a 1991 action thriller movie written by Gregory Widen and directed by Ron Howard. The movie sees Chicago firefighters in the pursuit of a mob hitman and stars William Baldwin, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Scott Glenn, Donald Sutherland, Rebecca De Mornay, Robert De Niro, Jason Gedrick, and J. T. Walsh. The movie follows Brian McCaffrey, whose father was a fireman and died when Brian was a kid. When he was older, he tried to become a firefighter but gave up, left the city, and for a while, tried various jobs. Eventually, he would try to become a fireman once more.
However, Brian is forced to work for his brother Stephen, with whom he doesn’t exactly get along. When Brian gets his picture in the newspaper and is praised as a hero when in reality, it was a mistake, a politician gives him a job working underneath the department’s arson detective, Donald Rimgale. Ringale appears to be involved in some odd fires when someone dies. Brian initially refuses, but after too many heated arguments with Stephen, he accepts. He also learns what it takes to be a fireman. But that is the plot of the movie; let’s discuss about the filming locations of Backdraft.
Backdraft Filming Locations
Ron Howard’s fireman epic was filmed in Oak Park and Hinsdale, the Chicago neighborhoods. Many of Frank Lloyd Wright’s houses and the elevator shaft shots that were filmed here, as well as the Frank Lloyd Wright museum, are in Oak Park. Chicago-based filming lasted from July 23, 1990, until December 8, 1990. The major actors went out on calls with actual Chicago firefighters before the shooting even began. And to prepare for their roles as firefighters in the movie, all of the key actors attended the Chicago Fire Academy as well.
Fire stations may be found at Archer and Sacramento Streets as well as the Southside Firehouse on West Cermak Road in Chinatown, a short distance west of the Cermak-Chinatown el stop on the Lake/Dan Ryan line. The burial scene was filmed in the famous Graceland Cemetery, which was established in 1860 and serves as the final resting place for many famous people from Chicago’s past, including the inventor of the sleeping car George Pullman, Marshall Field, and architect Mies van der Rohe. It is located in Wrigleyville on North Clark Street near Irving Park Road. At the base of the renowned Wrigley Building on Michigan Avenue in the heart of Chicago, the final, enormous parade of 2,000 firefighters was caught on camera.
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California
The lavish plaza entry to the former Bank of America World Headquarters, which is now more commonly known by its humdrum location of 555 California Street in the city’s Financial District, served as the grand entrance to the skyscraper in San Francisco. In Dirty Harry, the psycho killer Scorpio ambushed residents of SF from the rooftop of the same building. However, the lobby of the Hyatt Regency San Francisco is a confusing setting also featured in Mel Brooks’ sci-fi thriller Time After Time and with its glass elevators, the Hyatt Regency San Francisco.
The basement of a Century City office complex in Los Angeles was used to film the computer-controlled building monitoring center because it was, at least in part, a Twentieth Century Fox production. The sniveling cheapskate electrician Roger Simmons’ mansion is located at 2898 Vallejo Street at Baker Street in the upscale Pacific Heights neighborhood. This affluent neighborhood always comes across as a little shady on Screen.
Other Backdraft Filming Locations
Locker room sequences were filmed on the second floor of an unutilized firehouse at 14th and Michigan in Chicago. It is currently a restaurant called the Chicago Firehouse. Swayzak was on The Spirit of Chicago, a party boat docked at Navy Pier. Originally situated at 31st and Sacramento in Chicago, the Fire Department repair shops have recently moved to the huge Fleet Maintenance site at North and Throop.
Roof caving scene was filmed on the roof of a carpark at The South Loop Global market at Roosevelt and Clinton in Chicago. This place has been completely destroyed. A set for the Elevator Shaft sequence was constructed and carefully lowered into the swimming pool at Main North High School, 9511 West Harrison in DesPlaines, Illinois.
The Chicago Studio City, which is located at 5660 West Taylor in Chicago, provided the interiors for the chemical factory, the one in which Stephen saved a child from a fire, the one in which Tim was injured, and a few other scenes. Because of the dangers, the structure where the actual fire scenes were stored has been destroyed. The De Niro office in Chinatown, which was located at 43rd and Paulina, had an old fire station as its interior.
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