Trippin' Movies

Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure

Tripped: June 2011

Location: Phoenix - Tempe, Arizona

Man, it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything on here. I just sort of had to re-learn how to use this blog. Anyways - I’ve still got a backlog of posts ready to write up, so I guess I’d better do one today.

I moved to Los Angeles a few years ago and on my way across the country I decided that a good way to spend my time would be visiting the locations from one of my favorite movies, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.

Surprisingly enough, Excellent Adventure wasn’t filmed in California. It shot in Phoenix and its surrounding cities. Somehow they managed to find palm trees and trick America into thinking they were actually in San Dimas. Which is weird, because San Dimas is an actual city in Southern California. (I almost wrote “SoCal” instead but quickly corrected that mistake.)

But here’s our trip…

First off is the famed Circle K where strange things are afoot in the cinematic San Dimas. You really don’t appreciate just how many damn Circle K’s there are in Tempe, Arizona until you’re looking for a specific one. 

Now several internet sources reported a bunch of different Circle K’s to be Bill and Ted’s hangout spot, but most of them were wrong. I think we finally struck it rich on our third try. It looks relatively the same as it did when they filmed the movie except for some sensible changes. If you’re out trying to find this one yourself, remember - the one you’re looking for doesn’t have any gas pumps out front.

Also in Tempe, we’ve got the bowling alley that Napoleon gets thrown out of. Not pictured here is the pronunciation for “Tempe”. Your guess is as good as mine.

This location actually looked fairly identical to its 1988 self. It was pretty dark outside or I’d be able to show you some better examples. This place is located in a shopping center and is kind of a pain in the ass to find at night when you’ve never been there.

They filmed the interiors inside the same place, and the cool thing about a bowling alley is that it’s open to the public.

Unfortunately the uncool thing about a bowling alley is that it looks like every other bowling alley in the world and doesn’t give you very interesting pictures — especially when you’re comparing it to what it looked like over twenty years ago.

But some things do stay the same… or at least same-ish. This is Ted’s house in the film, which is located in Phoenix in the middle of a semi-sub division filled with houses that look exactly like Ted’s. Across the street are still lots of cacti like you see in the screenshot, but I couldn’t replicate the shot because it had to have been filmed from someone’s private driveway.  They shot the interior scenes here, too.

So here’s where it gets confusing. This address is said by at least three different online sources to be Bill’s house from the movie. We actually flagged down a neighbor after circling the neighborhood for a half hour. He had no idea who Bill and Ted were, but had said that this house had been completely remodeled recently and the owners had spent a fortune on it. That explains the house but not the trees in the yard. Those are some fairly big ass trees. Shouldn’t they have been there in the 80’s? I mean… I’m not botanist, but…

Another victim of severe remodeling is the fictional San Dimas High School where Bill and Ted go to learn and do most triumphant presentations. This school actually looked pretty fancy and new. It’s in Scottsdale, Arizona and looks nothing like it used to. The only constant in both pictures (and the only reason we knew we were in the right place) was the big mural on the side of the building…

Which looks like that up close, in case you were wondering. Which I’m sure you were a little curious or you wouldn’t be reading this right now.

This school was also the location of the most excellent history report scene where Abraham Lincoln’s immortal words will live on… immortally. Sadly that auditorium has since been torn down and replaced by a newer, less non-non-non heinous version. So unfortunately we won’t be able to bring you pictures of that.

Moving on, we’ve got the Metro Center Mall in Phoenix. Watch out for your robes, dude.

Unlike Dawn of the Dead, we weren’t really able to match that many locations up to the movie. It looks a lot different and newer, with the only real indicators being its ceiling — which looks the same.

Like DotD, there used to be an ice skating rink here. Bill the Kid and Genghis Kahn got busted by the cops on it. That’s gone, along with a ton of other places.

The food court has been completely remodeled, but if you look closely you can tell that the basic layout is the same. The walls in our picture are straight and as they go towards the left, they start to turn inwards a bit. That’s the same as in the screenshot. Also, look closely in the picture from the movie. There is a “New Jade Chinese Food” restaurant standing as the first block in the food court…

This is standing as the first block in the same location from the movie. Pretty cool. It like.. totally has to be the same place. (Read that in an Alex Winter voice.) Also in the mall, which made us laugh, was this store:

I know it’s got some writing in the green areas, but ignore it and imagine that these guys own a shoe store in Bill and Ted’s mall.

That’s about it for our most excellent adventure through the world of Bill and Ted. We didn’t get to Waterloo yet or many Bogus Journey locations, but we’ll be updating with those at some point.

Until then… be excellent to each other — and party on, Dudes.

Uh… San Dimas High School Football Rules!

-Clint

RoboCop

Tripped: January 2009

Location: Dallas, TX

In honor of the shitty RoboCop remake that’s in production now, I figured I’d go ahead and post our journey into the filming locations of the original. Most people get confused when I tell them that when I was in Texas I saw where they shot RoboCop. The fact that the movie takes place in Detroit and that that city itself was almost like a character in the film really throws people for a loop.

But, nope. They shot a very limited amount of the film up north. To my knowledge, they didn’t shoot a thing in Michigan at all. Who the hell wants to go to Michigan? The steel mill finale was shot somewhere outside of Pittsburgh and the rest was done in Dallas. I read/heard somewhere that Dallas was chosen because it looked desolate and futuristic — which I guess was pretty true. Either way, let’s kick it off, huh?

Alright — So this was the “Metro West Police Station” of Detroit in the movie. It’s where Murphy was transferred and got blown to hell shortly afterwards. In reality it’s the old Dallas High School. Nothing much changed from 1987 to 2009, except that the school looks pretty condemned. We took these pictures three years ago, so this place could very well be torn down now. 

This is the street side of the building. You can see that it was a high school. The movie filmed the backside of the school with the attached parking lot. Who knew? The interiors of the police station were filmed in a Masonic Lodge or something like that. We didn’t look for that. They weren’t filmed in this place, so don’t get your hopes up.

Now if you look at the black building in the first two pictures… This is some kind of mall or something. (I’m blanking on the name.) They actually filmed inside that building to represent the OCP headquarters. The futuristic elevator from the film is still there and operational.

This is about all they used from inside this place, though. Most of the film, as you’ll see in a bit, relied heavily on matte paintings to really pull through that futuristic look that Paul Verhoeven wanted you to see. Regardless, we took a ride in the elevator.

We rode up and down four or five times waiting on someone to get in it with us. We were finally joined by some fancy smancy looking lady (it was that kind of mall). I told her “Hey, RoboCop’s been in this elevator before.” The look she gave me could not have given less of a shit about me or what I had told her. Priceless.

Next we move to a different part of the movie….

This is the scene in the movie shortly after we first meet RoboCop. Someone in the Mayor’s office goes crazy and starts shooting hostages he’s taken at City Hall. This isn’t City Hall, it’s the old Dallas Police Department.

A cool fact about this place is that in its parking garage, you’ll find the spot where Lee Harvey Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby when he was being transferred.

Same place. Pretty cool.

Another “connection” to the Kennedy assassination:

The place where Red Forman and company were blowing up the store front windows hasn’t changed much. It’s not on fire anymore. The cars are a little newer, too. A little.

But anyway, the Kennedy connection — and I could be wrong — but I remember that this place was right off of Dealey Plaza (where Kennedy got shot). His little motorcade would’ve driven right past these buildings on the way to history. 

What do we have left?

This vacant lot (that was vacant in 2009 - I’m sure they rebuilt something there since then) was the gas station that Emil blew up after that whole “You’re dead! We killed you! You’re dead! We Killed you! You’re dead! We Killed you!” moment.

I don’t know how in the hell we ended up finding this place, but it was identified by the red brick building that you can barely see in the background of the screenshot. That building is something like the African American Thespian Society building or something like that. It hasn’t changed a bit since the movie was filmed, which helped immensely in finding this location.

And — like always — I saved the best for last:

This is the OCP headquarters, which in real life is the actual City Hall of Dallas… and it looks like this:

Even without the top floors, it’s a pretty impressive looking place. It hasn’t changed any… except for having lost a good 3/4 of itself to time. The top of this building (if you haven’t guessed already) was a matte painting in the film. Sorry to ruin the movie for you. It was going to happen anyway, remember? They’re making a “reboot”. That’s the new Hollywood word for “punch in the balls”. 

It looks like the doors haven’t changed.

And you knew we couldn’t end this article without a shot of someone pretending to be an ED-209. 

In summation, the trip was pretty great. I’d say it’s a must-see for any fan of RoboCop. Most of the film was actually filmed on location, even the interiors. We didn’t really have the time or desire to find the rest of the places. We drove around for several hours trying to find the liquor store that RoboCop saved from the robber. No dice.

That’s about it for now, boys and girls. We’ll see ya next time. Until then, it’s your move, creep.

Clint

unluckymonkey asked: Hello! I stumbled across your page when trying to learn where certain movie locations were shot around here in Austin. I always love fitting movie locales into family trips and whatnot, so I really enjoyed reading your Tumblr. I wish there were more posts. Anyhow, it seems like you were able to find more locations than most people posting about this sort of thing, and I was wondering how you went about finding all these places. Any tips you'd like to share? Thanks you, Jenna Johnson

Hey! So basically I found a few addresses online and I just show up to the places and start asking questions. Sometimes everything’s available online and sometimes I find places just based on talking to people at the locations. It’s a mix. I have a ton I haven’t posted yet. For instance, the pool and several other locations from Caddyshack are no longer there. Same with the restaurant from Porky’s. That’s just the kind of stuff you find out when you get to a certain place. I’ll make some new posts soon, so stick with me. I’ve been working a lot. I live in LA now, though, so there’s no reason not to make a post a week.

Rushmore

Tripped: January 2010

Location: Houston, TX

So part of our Texas trip was devoted towards another Bill Murray movie. This time: Rushmore. What’s cool about this movie is that it was shot entirely on location in and around Houston, TX, mostly in places that you can visit without worrying about getting the cops called on you, which is always a perk.

What’s funny is that this movie is obscure enough that everyone we talked to about it with were really excited to discuss the filming and gave us a lot of info and whatnot. You can find out the same info on IMDb.com for the most part, but it was still nice of them. Usually when you visit a place from a huge movie like Ghostbusters or Caddyshack, you can just tell people are sick of talking about it. It wasn’t like that with Rushmore. Check out the trip below.

We’ll start with the less exciting ones.

This is Max Fischer’s house and it looks exactly like it did in the movie. Well, pretty much. No major renovations like you’ll see later in this post. Like in the film, the house is located next door to a cemetery, which was also featured in the movie.

Speaking of the cemetery:

Cemeteries are always the best filming locations to visit. They’re quiet, they’re public, and they rarely change even fifty years after something was filmed. 

That’s when you can pull off shot match-ups like this.

There’s a tree missing - but if you’ve seen the movie, you know why.

Alright, so you’ve had enough of the cemetery. You get that this was the same cemetery. Hooray, we went to a cemetery.

Next: Another house!

So this is Miss Cross’s house from the movie. The bottom picture is, like it always is, the one we took. It’s almost not even fun because it’s so identical.

This is Lamar High School where Max has to go after being expelled from Rushmore. It’s actually right down the street from St. John’s, which served as Rushmore in the film. This isn’t the same part of the school.

We would’ve gotten more pictures/better screen shot match-ups but school was in session when we were there and there’s nothing creepier than a bunch mid-twenties guys walking around taking pictures of high school kids.

Which brings us to:

The same thing can be said for St. John’s School. It has a big gate around it and it’s really impossible to take any pictures that are worth a damn. The bad thing about this place, too, is that it was severely remodeled at some point in the past ten years. The picture that we took is actually the same spot you see in the screenshot. In person you can actually see the change in color in bricks from one spot to the other. It took forever to figure this out. We ended up asking some of the security guards at the school about the spot. An older guy that actually worked on the film is the one who shed some light on this.

This school, of course, was actually attended by Wes Anderson when he was a kid. So maybe Rushmore’s a bit autobiographical. I’ve got more pictures, but nothing matches the screenshots. You wouldn’t recognize it if you just happened to drive by.

That can’t be said for every location, though.

This looks like an airport or a racetrack or something in the movie, but it’s actually a football stadium parking lot. It looks desolate, too, but it’s right in the middle of town. There’s a Wendy’s right across the street, which is where we had lunch before taking this picture.

This is the view from across the street of the Fischer Barber Shop. That Washateria is shot to hell now. I’m betting they spruced it up and bought that sign just for the movie and it’s just rotted away since ‘98.

What I noticed about these pictures, too, is how the cracks in the road are still the same as they were at the time the movie was made.

This was the best part of the Rushmore trip, I think.

This place was an actual business at the time the movie was made. Well, it still is. That’s what the cool part was. So we went during business hours and my friend Paul got his beard trimmed in the same chair where Bill Murray got a shave in the movie.

That was the craziest thing about this place. Much of the furniture and stuff on the walls actually appeared in the movie, too, and they’re really proud of it. They’ve got a bunch of articles and stuff hanging about the movie, which I read while Paul got his white trash on. It was more exciting than the Edward Scissorhands hair salon location. This place was like actually walking into a movie - which is weird - because normally a film will just build a set instead of using someone’s business that’s already there.

Wes Anderson must’ve been tight on money when they shot this thing.

All in all it was a great trip. We saw pretty much everything we’d taken screenshots of, which rarely happens. I wish we’d gotten to go in some of the houses and schools to really do a crazy screen shot/today comparison, but whatever. I think you guys still had an interesting read with what we did here. If you ever get the wild idea to do this trip like we did, I’d just stick with the barbershop.

Take care.

Clint

The Exorcist

Tripped: January 2009

Location: Georgetown, Washington D.C.

So here’s a quick little snippet of a trip. On our way to the mall from Dawn of the Dead, we made a quick stop by the world famous house and stairs from the 1973 film The Exorcist.

A little story on the house: If you visit it in person you’ll be a little surprised because only half of it’s actually there. It wasn’t torn down or anything, what actually happened with this place is that they built an additional half for production.

I guess they couldn’t find a house that was adjacent enough to a stairwell, so they had to partially build one. Regan’s room was actually part of the fake side of the house. The real house isn’t near the stairs, but the rest looks pretty much the same. Check it out.

This is about as much as you can match up that iconic poster shot. There’s a big fence there now, trees have grown up, the lamp post is different and in another spot, and, like I said before, half of the house is gone.

It’s definitely the same house, though, as you can see here. See the open door and the black rectangle thing inside that may be a mail slot? You can notice the lack of half of the building here, as well.

This is one match-up that I’m particularly proud of. We were about to leave when a cab rolled up. I had the camera on still and managed to catch it in sort of the same spot.

Is that some impressive nerdery or what?

And then of course, there’s this stairwell, which actually is right beside the lot that the house is on. Aside from some change in graffiti, it’s pretty much the same. As you can see here:

So in summation: If you’re ever in Georgetown or D.C., you should probably go check this place out. It’s great for film location buffs. There’s no sneaking around, the place is instantly recognizable from the movie, and it’s completely on public property… well… the stairs are, anyway, which are the best part.

There’s also a little gas station at the bottom of the stairs, which makes the place a little less sinister. I’m sure if it was there in ‘73, they made a conscious effort not to feature it in the film.

That’s about it, folks. Oh, and your mother sucks cocks in hell. Don’t forget about Mother’s Day tomorrow.

Clint

Edward Scissorhands

Tripped: August 2009

Where: Lutz, FL/Lakeland,FL

This was a trip I’d wanted to take for a while. Who hasn’t wanted to go to the neighborhood from Edward Scissorhands? Until I went there, I thought it’d even be cool to live there. Nope. It’s in the middle of Nowheresville. You’d hate it.

Here’s a little backstory I’ve gathered about the place: When they filmed this movie, they picked a neighborhood that reminded Tim Burton of where he grew up and tried to replicate that 60’s feel. They paid the residents of the neighborhood to paint their houses and temporarily relocated them all to a nearby hotel for the duration of the filming.

So first off, there weren’t any houses there that were still painted in pastel colors. That was a disappointment. That’s over and done with. There was no sign of any hedges remotely sculpted into animals. There were tons of trees grown up that weren’t even planted when the movie was filmed. You wouldn’t even know that this was the neighborhood from the movie unless you specifically drove 700 miles just to see it.

Second off — this neighborhood was huge. They only used one tiny part of one tiny street from in the actual movie. The rest of the neighborhood they either left alone or it wasn’t built yet. You decide. Ready for some pictures?

This is the view from Edward’s castle. This is the best I could do by standing on top of my car.

This is the view of what should be a giant hill and a castle. It’s not there. There’s a giant pond/small lake where it “was”. The castle in the film was actually just a matte painting that was superimposed into the shot. The sets of the castle were built on a soundstage. Pretty much everything else was filmed in or around these houses. See how much the trees have grown up since 1991?

This is Winona Ryder’s family’s house from the movie. See how that little shrub turned into a giant tree in 20 years? 

Besides The Evil Dead, this is as close as we’ve come to trespassing. I really wanted to knock on the door of this house and see if the folks would let us take some pics of their house…. but I think the best thing to do in these cases is to leave the home owner alone… even though I think they’re kinda asking for it by living in a movie house.

This isn’t a very important screenshot, but we spent forever trying to find this damn house. This could be a different house, but it’s the closest one we could find on this street.

This is Anthony Michael Hall’s house from the movie.

Now we’re going to Lakeland, Florida.

This is the shopping center where Edward’s salon was. It’s in desperate need of a paint job.

Still - not much has changed. I’m willing to bet that’s the same paint we saw in the movie. I’m sure the film crew probably had this place painted, too.

It’s like visiting a ship wreck or something.

This was the coolest part of the Scissorhands trip. Most of the time when you movie trip, you’re kinda restrained to just stuff that’s on public property. Edward’s salon now happens to be a wine shop, which just happens to be open to the public.

The owner/operator was a really nice guy. When he saw us taking pictures and not really looking at the wine, he asked us if we were there because of Edward Scissorhands. He said we were his monthly quota. It’s strange that a movie so old still gets so many fans visiting its locations.

He then showed us into his office, which was also used in the movie.

When we walked through the curtain, we were kind os surprised. It was awesome:

It was the exact same room. It wasn’t a set in the movie like you’d think it would’ve been. What’s crazier is that the room was still painted the same pastel color from the movie. We finally saw our trip’s worth of Scissorhands pastel. Everything was the same, with some boxes and office junk added to it.

But the icing on the cake:

You can see that the “Danger: High Voltage” tag is the same that was in the movie. You can also see that the peg board and wiring to the box is the same, and that it’s still missing that second screw that holds it down. Way cool. Sorry the picture’s blurry - I was trying to be nonchalant with my picture taking so the wine store guy wouldn’t see how much I was nerding out inside.

Sadly the restaurant from the movie, “Sambo’s”, was torn down about ten years ago. It was a real place, though, we found out from the wine guy.

That pretty much covers it for Edward Scissorhands, I think. I hope you guys enjoyed reading about the trip as much as I did going on it. If you’re ever in Lutz, Florida…. well, I don’t recommend checking the place out. You’ve seen just about as much here as you would actually being there.

Take care.

-Clint 

Office Space

Tripped: January 2010

Where: Austin, TX

This was a fun one. My pal Paul and I drove out to Texas for Office Space and a few other movies, but this one was pretty sweet. Seeing locations from movies that aren’t that old are impressive because they haven’t changed at all. Well, not much, anyway.

We’ll start out with Chotchkie’s, which is where Jennifer Aniston’s character worked in the movie.

The location for the exterior of this place was actually vacant at the time of filming. I think they’d just finished the building or something. Regardless, it’s now a CHASE bank.

The interior of Chotchkie’s, however, is actually the Alligator Grill in Austin, TX. 

It was cooler than they made it out to be in the movie. It’s more like a cool local sports bar than a TGI Friday’s.

This is about the only place in the restaurant that’s the same. Everything else has been remodeled and is hardly recognizable anymore.

Sadly, though, I think this place closed - or at least that’s what I heard. This was two years ago when we were there.

That’s still the same, though.

Sadly this apartment complex isn’t actually called Morningwood.

Apparently Peter’s apartment was in a different complex than the entrance to his apartment complex.. We couldn’t find his actual apartment, but we did find this….

This is the closest I think I’ve ever come to matching something completely. I missed the tree a little.

If that would’ve been the same sign I would’ve stolen the shit out of it.

The movie was actually filmed inside the building that we have pictures of here. The security guard at the front door wouldn’t let us come in to snap pictures, even though it wasn’t a work day.

He said the place is unrecognizable now, anyway, so it probably wasn’t a total loss.

Whatever. That about does it for our Office Space adventure. 

-Clint

The Evil Dead

Tripped: January 2009

Location: Morristown, Tennessee

This is probably the most exciting trip we’ve done. We trekked to the elusive spot where the cabin from The Evil Dead once sat. Technically it still sits there.

What I’ve heard is that in the 80’s some kids snuck out there and threw a party in the cabin and accidentally burned the whole thing down.

It’s gone now but tons of tin, brick, and wood fragments remain. It’s instantly recognizable by the trees.

We drove up to Tennessee with a map/directions that I’d found online. I’m not going to tell you how to find this place. Find it yourself, it’s not hard. This place is on private property and I’ve read all kinds of stories online about the owner threatening people with guns and whatever. Nothing like that happened with us.

We parked about a mile away and entered the woods in kind of a secluded area. That’s all you gotta do. Use your head, folks. Trespassing’s a lot easier than people make it out to be.

Here’s the pics:

The entrance still looks relatively the same.

That’s where the cabin stood. The trees, luckily, are a dead give away.

Doesn’t seem like they’re in Tennessee, does it? Well they are.

Okay - so this is my favorite part here. In the movie, they used Rob Tapert’s (the producer) parents’ house for the basement scenes. The cabin in the movie didn’t actually have a basement. Apparently Bruce Campbell’s brother and some other folks dug a big hole for possessed Cheryl to stand in throughout the film. The cool part?

There’s still at least a 5 ft hole where it was. So cool.

Nifty.

The fireplace and the roof are about all that remain of the cabin. Pretty big bummer but still awesome to see.

When I was there which was, terrifyingly enough, three years ago, the land was for sale. I don’t know the current status of it but hopefully it’s still there. It’d be terrible for the place to get bulldozed. 

I wanted to get more pictures but we were kind of in a get-in, get-out mind set when we were there. As far as I know these are the only ones anyone’s put online. Hope you enjoyed it.

Take care.

-Clint

Night of the Living Dead

Tripped: January 2009

So me and some pals stopped by the cemetery from the opening scene of Night of the Living Dead. We did a little backtracking, too, and found some of the setups of shots from the opening credits. Keep in mind this was forty years after the filming. I think the place has held up pretty well.

Alright, so this is as close as I could get without being run over. You’re welcome. 

I think it’s pretty amazing how much this place hasn’t changed in so many decades. This is Evans City, PA, by the way. And we’re on our way to the Evans City Cemetery.

This is the entrance to the cemetery and my mom’s Jeep that I was driving; A poor substitute for a GTO, I know.

Cemeteries are always the best places to go movie tripping. They rarely change. The only differences we’ve gotten here are more graves and less trees. Like whoever the hell these Drebert folks are. Were.

Tree’s gone.

What’s gone?

Now this headstone’s been moved or something. We matched up the background to the screen shot.

I hope when I die someone uses my grave in a cult movie without my permission.

So that’s about it for this trip. Unfortunately the farm house from the movie was torn down shortly after they filmed it. I didn’t even try to figure out where it was. You guys wouldn’t even care if I had, would you?

The basement of the farm house, however, was supposedly filmed in the basement of the place that had processed the film for George Romero, or so I’ve heard. It’s supposed to be in Pittsburgh somewhere so maybe someone out there will get lucky one day and find it.

That does it for me. Take care.

-Clint

Ghostbusters: New York Locations

Tripped: January 2008

This trip was special in that it was the first time I’d intentionally gone to a filming location and that Ghostbusters happens to be my favorite movie. 

The movie takes place in New York City but the majority of it was filmed in Southern California.

Here’s a look at the locations they used in New York. First let me say that when we were walking around here, it was anywhere from 5 to 14 degrees. Don’t visit New York City in January. I think part of my balls are still frozen from that.

We’ll start with Columbia University.

So here we are for the opening shot of the movie. Ivan Reitman said in the audio commentary that he was trying to give the movie a gothic look by using lots of statues throughout the movie. Here’s the first one. I’d tell you who this is a statue of but I have no idea. Ask someone who went to Columbia.

This is something I’d always wanted to do. Since the movie they put up some shitty fence thing just where my feet are that won’t let me lie my legs all the way down. It’s like they did that just to spite Ghostbuster fans.

This is my pal Drew that was with me. The shot doesn’t line up exactly because we were alone and had to prop up the camera up and set a timer. EXCUSE ME.

So you see here that Columbia hasn’t really changed at all. Big surprise. Moving on.

This is the interior of the New York Public Library. This place was way too big to be a library. I’m not sure If this was the right room but they all looked pretty much the same to me and we had a lot of ground to cover.

The basement of the library where the Ghostbusters see the ghost was actually filmed in  the Los Angeles Public Library, which I’ll post pictures of whenever I find a place to park in downtown LA.

So this is the Lincoln Center fountain in Manhattan. They completely tore this place a new one a few years ago and now it’s been remodeled. I got to see it before that happened, though. Here I am standing in the same spot. My camera was a little different than Ivan Reitman’s.

So this place ended up being right next to City Hall. I was pretty surprised. We found it without even looking for it. It’s apparently where you go to get a marriage license in NYC.

So this is Tavern on the Green. I heard they were closing this place, too. Not sure if that happened or not. This is as close as you can get to banging on the window like Louis did in the movie. It ruined my plans to do that.

After Louis gets possessed by Vinz Clortho he runs through Columbus Circle at the end/beginning of Central Park.

They’ve filmed a million other movies here, but the one that sticks out most in my mind is Taxi Driver. Senator Palantine gives his speech here and Travis Bickle almost assassinates him.

Here’s the Manhattan Museum of Art from Ghostbusters II.

In real life it’s the Museum of the American Indian. Not as exciting, I feel.

Going back in time to the first movie again, here’s Dana Barrett’s apartment building.

It looks exactly the same as it did in ‘84. It sits at 55 Central Park West. In the movie they added a 0 to the end of the address to really mess people up. That was sarcasm.

It’s not nearly as tall as they make it seem in the movie, but there looks to be an ancient Sumerian temple up top.

See what I mean?

If you look really close here you can see that the “Matera Canvas” sign was actually in the movie, too. Pretty nifty.

You knew this was coming.

I think this is anyone’s favorite part, here. Even for people that aren’t die hard Ghostbusters fans, this is a must see when visiting New York. It’s iconic. Come on.

What’s really cool about this place is that it’s so small and tiny, you wouldn’t expect it at all. The interiors in the movie were actually filmed in an abandoned Fire House in Los Angeles, which is in a reeeeeeally shitty neighborhood. I’ve driven past it. Maybe I’ll bring you pics of that one day.

We were walking, looking for this building, and BAM, there it was. The Ghostbuster house. The toy that I had when I was a kid - all of the sudden I was standing in front of it. So Weird.

If you can stop by when the doors are open the firemen are pretty welcoming to fans. You know they’re probably sick of hearing about the god damn movie, but they’re nice. It was a little embarrassing, though. NY firemen can be intimidating.

They sell their own Hook and Ladder 8 shirts there and I bought one. I wear a medium and this fireman with a Brooklyn accent called me a wuss for wanting a medium so I got a large instead. It’s too big. Fucking firemen.

One last thing - when we walked in the Brooklyn guy was like, “Oh, you like Ghostbusters? There’s the sign.”

So that’s hanging in there. I wonder who has the second half of it.

So now that you’ve seen my ultimate Ghostbusters nerd quest, you should check out my ultimate Ghostbusters nerd venture. I made a 45 minute Ghostbusters movie a few years ago. It’s - dare I say - watchable? 

You can check out the trailer HERE or skip that and watch the movie HERE. Your choice, of course.

-Clint