Soccer Dad

Starring baltimore

Chris Kaltenbach writes about how Baltimore played a role in the upcoming movie Live Free and Die Hard starring Bruce Willis. It even stood in for Washington DC in a couple of scenes. Most of the article is about the process of getting a city to become a setting for a movie. At the end he tells you what to look for:
On the big screen
A few of the highlights from Baltimore's co-starring role in Live Free or Die Hard.

• As John McClane (Bruce Willis) and his computer-geek charge, Matt Ferrell (Justin Long), wind their way through the clogged streets of Washington, they're actually winding their way through the clogged streets of Baltimore. Specifically, they're stuck near the corner of Calvert and Fayette streets, with the Battle Monument clearly in view. The sharp-eyed may notice that the film has traffic heading the wrong way on both streets.

• The film's helicopter chase was filmed in Baltimore, giving audiences a chopper's-eye view of the city's central business district.

• Kevin Smith plays Warlock, a Baltimore-based computer hacker of mythic proportions who works out of a "command center" in the basement of his mother's rowhouse, played by a home in the 2000 block of Madison St.

• The film's climax is set at the Social Security complex in Woodlawn. Although the scenes were shot elsewhere, when was the last time Woodlawn got mentioned so prominently in the movies?

(It's interesting that Woodlawn gets some focus. About 30 years ago I had a summer job in Woodlawn and one of the other summer students was Chris Kaltenbach.)

The Sun also has a list of all movies that were set in Baltimore. I remember And Justice for All and the Seduction of Joe Tynan. (I'm sure if I watched the latter now, I'd laugh at its absolute silliness, but in my late teens I thought it wasn't bad.)

baltimore, live free or die hard.