Part 2

The Actual Southern California Locations
where 2008's "Hancock" was filmed.

The camera zooms in to a tall glass building, and we are then introduced to 'Ray Embrey' (Jason Bateman),
an idealistic public relations man, as we see him giving a pitch for his "AllHeart symbol" program,
to a corporate board that obviously is not buying his charity effort.

The building (exterior) we see is the Plaza Tower, at 600 Anton Blvd., in Costa Mesa). The second tallest
building in Orange Country, it's located at the NW corner of Anton Blvd & Avenue of the Arts, just east of
the South Coast Plaza mall.

Hancock and Ray meet when Hancock rescues Ray after Ray's car stalls on a railroad track,
and he is about to be hit by a train.

That railroad scene was shot in San Pedro, near the L.A. Harbor, where the railroad/trolley tracks
cross 5th Street (right where Sampson Way bends from north to west to become 5th Street).

(I shot the photo below - of those same railroad tracks - in 2008.)

Ray takes Hancock (to Ray's) home, and introduces him to his family, including his
wife (Charlize Theron), who is not happy to have the super-powered bum in her house.

You'd assume by looking at it that the cozy residential neighborhood where Ray lives
is a real one - perhaps somewhere in the Valley. But the truth is that Ray's home and
its neighborhood is the only major location in this movie that was completely fake.

They simply built the Embrey home as a set on "Elm Street", a
block of fake residential homes on the back lot of Universal Studios.

The scene where Hancock throws a stranded whale back into the ocean was filmed at
Sycamore Cove Beach, about 40 miles north of Santa Monica, in Ventura County.

Most of the scene was faked via CGI (including the giant whale on the beach), but the beach
itself and the spectators on it were real.

You'll find Sycamore Cove Beach at 9000 W. Pacific Coast Highway, about 2 1/2 miles northwest
of Leo Cabrillo Beach in Malibu, and part of Point Magu State Park.

After a public official calls for Hancock's arrest, Ray convinces Hancock to turn himself in and spend
time in jail, as part of an effort to improve his public image.

The news conference scene, where Hancock announces his surrender, was filmed in front of the
John Ferraro Building (the Department of Water & Power Building) at 111 N. Hope Street,
in downtown Los Angeles (next to the Music Center).

When it comes to the prison scenes, they used two different locations for the prisons.

The aerial shot (above) is of the Mira Loma Detention Center, at 45100 60th St, west of Lancaster, CA

         


The on-the-ground jail compound scenes (below), where Hancock arrives at the compound, were shot at
the now-closed Fred C. Nelles Youth Correctional Center, at 11850 Whittier Blvd, in Whittier, CA.

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The photos on this page are stills from the DVD of "Hancock"
(which you can buy by clicking here) and are copyright Universal Pictures.

The rest of the page is Copyright © 1999-2024-Gary Wayne / Seeing-Stars.com