Thank You, lived in Mosman 69 to 75 , met Sandy by chance at a Mosman gym, had a brief talk about making Stone, great memories. I'm now 72, Stone had a real cult following amongst the generation of rebellious teens, Sydney has gems of great locations, truly magnificent city. Great post
@indysolo81 thanks that walk, around Sirus Cove at bottom of Taronga zoo then back up the hill to military Rd is beautiful and scenic but as a casual runner those hills are a killer.
That ship in Mort Bay was the Empress of Australia, which used to sail to Tasmania. The Star Hotel was converted to small units a long time ago. Well done.
I had the privilege of meeting Ken Shorter some years ago through a mutual friend. I asked him where some of the locations that Stone was filmed in actually were and he knew them all in great detail. Street names etc, he had forgotten nothing!
What struck me is the lack of traffic in the movie,the roads were so open.They have been stuffing people into Sydney that its become a nightmare to live in.
@@Westyrulz The reason you don't see Sydney's 1973 (YES 1973! Because most of the movie outdoor action was shot in '73 in time for further painstaking production in time for the '74 release) weekday congested traffic was because cast & crew were advised to maintain strict secrecy prior to piling into North Shore suburbia on WEEKENDS to film events like the Midnite/Stone scratch race. These scenes were shot rapidfire in & around Mosman fairly early on Saturday mornings before weekend traffic had gathered. Local police (only a few) stood by some wooden barriers placed to restrict local traffic while film crew used cameras mounted on platforms fitted to then new Holden 1 ton utes to capture the action. We lived at Balgowlah Heights up until the 22nd of Oct '73. The old man was the mechanic at the Ampol servo at Balgowlah Heights. Someone who called in for fuel let it slip they were filming a "Bikie Movie" with "Lairied Up" "Big Jap" bikes at Mosman on the coming Saturday morning. So, the old man got my brother & me up at the crack of dawn, bundled us into the old FB Holden panel van, drove us over the Spit Bridge, up a mile or so, hung a left & sure enough here's all these late model bikes with bikini fairings & wild outlandish paintjobs, bikers in cut off denim vests & leathers & 2 modified V8 Holden 1 ton utes with tripods & bulky movie cameras. We had to stand behind the barriers & remain silent while filming was in progress. Mind you, I imagine Sydney weekday traffic is a gazillion times more congested now compared to what it was when we left Sydney in Oct '73. It must have been Aug, Sept or the first couple of weeks of Oct in '73 when we saw these then very new customised Kawasaki Z900 movie star bikes. Things were very different then. No one had ever even heard of custom painted bikes in Aust at that point. There were a few Honda Four Choppers getting around with extended forks, raised handle bars, weird mufflers & tall sissy bars & plenty of hot Triumphs & Nortons, but these new howling Kawasakis were like a whole new dimension. I sometimes hung around at the Ampol servo on Saturday mornings when the old man pumped fuel & occasionally you'd see a clagged old Walla wobble in running sick & dribbling oil, some Jap commuter bikes, the odd Pommy bike but when these Kwakas hit town it was like an alien invasion.
Of course. Those were the people of Mad Max, their lives before the wars took place. Remember, Toad didn't die, and later formed his own biker gang. Absolutely, this IS the beginning of Mad Max. Only better.
You can pretty much get to any of the locations. Probably come up short if you wanted to take your bikes into the battery fortifocations. They are all fenced off.
