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Union Station
“I grew up in a tough neighborhood and we used to say ‘You can get further with a kind word and a gun than you can with just a kind word.'”
Al Capone (Robert De Niro)
Brian de Palma knows that some of the sequences in the script are fictitious, but he still wants to shoot in the real places marked by the war on crime of Eliot Ness and his gang. The sequence considered the most cult of the film sees the characters in a gunfight at the level of the stairs of Union Station.
In this scene, Eliot Ness and his men watch apprehensively on the steps of the train station, ready for the gangsters to appear at any minute, when suddenly a woman begins to climb the stairs with her stroller. Helped by the Treasury agents, the young mother arrives upstairs when the shooting breaks out. The baby carriage and its little tenant then start to descend the steps. A masterful lesson in directing, full of Hitchcock-like shots, this scene is a true demonstration of strength.
Cult! movies: 100 mythical places of cinema [French Edition]
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Since then, it is impossible to go up or down the stairs of Union Station without thinking about this shooting, which fortunately had a less dramatic outcome than expected. It was brilliantly parodied in the comedy The Naked gun 33⅓: The Final Insult and remains one of the most intense films of the 1980s. The film certainly distorted the story a bit, but did so with panache. It is the most famous feature film centered on Eliot Ness and his nemesis, Al Capone.
Despite four Oscar nominations nominations, Sean Connery was the only one to receive the famous statuette in the category of best supporting actor.
Chicago Union Station
Chicago’s largest train station, Union Station was first opened in 1881. Today, it carries more than 54,000 people daily.
The first version of Union Station opened in 1881. In 1913, reconstruction work began and was completed in 1925. In Beaux-Arts style, it is one of the most famous monuments of the American Renaissance movement. It reached its peak during the Second World War but was threatened with destruction afterwards. However, it is still there, guaranteeing a history as rich as fascinating. It also appears in the credits of My Best Friend’s Wedding, Flags of Our Fathers, Public Enemies and Man of Steel.
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The Paris guide to the 1000 cult places of films, series, music, comics and novels
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The café of Amélie, the mansion of Untouchables, the jazz club of the finale of La La Land, the Hôtel du Nord of the mythical replica of Arletty “Atmosphere”, the cinema of A bout de souffle, the restaurant of Ratatouille, the quays of the Seine of Midnight in Paris, the secret places of the Da Vinci Code, the grocery store of January in La Traversée de Paris , the Bridge of Inception and Peur sur la ville, the addresses of the spectacular scenes of Mission Impossible 6, but also series Call my agent, Gears, Le Bureau des légendes, Sense8, Sex and The City, Gossip Girl…
Etienne Daho’s Café de Flore, Jay-Z and Kanye West’s hotel in Nas in Paris, Serge Gainsbourg’s Poinçonneur des Lilas metro station, Serge Reggiani and Marc Lavoine’s Mirabeau Bridge, Mc Solaar’s Lyon station…
The places evoked in the comics Adèle Blanc-Sec, Largo Winch, Blake and Mortimer, Michel Vaillant…
But also in the novels of Ernest Hemingway, Victor Hugo, Leo Malet, Daniel Pennac, Marc Levy, Guillaume Musso… you’ll find all the must-see places of Parisian Pop Culture in this new guide.
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Discover all the places The Untouchables on our map
By Gilles Rolland
Passionné de cinéma, de rock and roll, de séries TV et de littérature. Rédacteur de presse et auteur des livres Le Heavy Metal au cinéma, Paroles de fans Guns N' Roses, Paroles de fans Rammstein et Welcome to my Jungle : 100 albums rock et autres anecdotes dépareillées. Adore également voyager à la recherche des lieux les plus emblématiques de la pop culture.