Brannigan | 1975

A US cop comes to London to apprehend an escaped villain, in John Wayne’s only English picture.

The criminal mastermind is quite obviously the English Tourist Board, as every event takes place in front of a famous London landmark. The muffed postal drop filmed in the middle of Piccadilly Circus, where the villains manage to escape through convenient, if unlikely, sewers (isn't there a tube station down there somewhere?).

Villain Ben Larkin (John Vernon) stays in luxury at the Dorchester Hotel, 53 Park Lane, Mayfair, W1, also featured in 2004 rom-com Wimbledon and in 60s classic Morgan – A Suitable Case For Treatment.

Jim Brannigan (Wayne) and Det Sgt Thatcher (Judy Geeson) enjoy a meal at famed celeb eaterie Mario and Franco’s Terrazza, which subsequently became Italian restaurant Lupo (now itself closed), 50 Dean Street at Romilly Street, Soho W1.

Brannigan has to borrow a tie when he lunches with top cop Commander Swann (Richard Attenborough) at the Garrick Club, 15 Garrick Street, the gentlemen’s club which numbered Charles Dickens among its members.

Another famed gents’ club: Larkin is kidnapped from the lavish Royal Automobile Club (RAC), 89 Pall Mall. Just look at the famously extravagant swimming pool.

Brannigan’s temporary London home is 61-80 York Mansions, Prince of Wales Drive alongside Battersea Park, south London (though when the villains booby-trap his toilet with a bomb, the resulting hole in the wall mysteriously reveals a view of the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park). Whatever.

He moves in with Jennifer Thatcher, at Douglas House, 6 Maida Avenue, Maida Vale, west London (which as it happens is next door to A Fish Called Wanda’s ‘Kipling Mansions’).

The obligatory pub fight, where everyone ends up flailing at everyone else, was filmed in The Lamb Tavern in the centre of the Victorian arcaded Leadenhall Market at the foot of the new Lloyds Building (tube: Bank; Northern and Central Lines), which also houses the entrance to ‘The Leaky Cauldron’ in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. More recently, Heath Ledger charms the ladies here when the travelling show is set up in Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus.

When the guy he's followed from the Lamb is shot, Brannigan runs out of the flat – which turns out to be south of Battersea Park, SW11, not far from the flat which was blown up earlier. The assassin (James Booth) makes off east along Warriner Gardens and leaps into a car.

On the corner with Beechmore Road, Brannigan commandeers the yellow Ford Capri coupé with the deathless line "Follow that car!"

The ensuing chase takes them to Tower Bridge, although bizarrely they're approaching it from the north. London's geography is not the film's strongpoint.

In the movie's most famous scene, the Capri makes the leap across across the gap of a half-opened Tower Bridge, spanning the Thames alongside the Tower of London. Despite its appearance, the mock-Gothic stylings, disguise a relatively modern wonder of Victorian engineering, opened in 1894. You can access the highlevel walkway (with a glass floor) and visit the bridge's impressive Engine Rooms. Yes, it's the walkway taken over by Mysterio in Spider-Man: Far From Home.

The Metropolitan Police HQ, Scotland Yard, seems to have jumped the Thames too, from its home of the time in Victoria. The view of the old County Hall from the windows is obviously south of the River Thames. These scenes were shot in St Thomas’ Hospital.

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