
The actual Southern
California locations where
the 2008 movie "Pineapple
Express" was filmed.
Part
2

Map of
the police chase

The light blue
line marks the route of the police chase.
Hover your cursor over the
red dots to identify spots along the
chase route.
Click on the red dots to jump
to the matching descriptions & photos below.


- The long arrest/chase scene starts
out with Dale (Seth Rogen) & Saul
(James Franco) smoking pot in
an alley with some local school boys.
This scene was filmed in an
alleyway in North Hollywood.
The alley runs north/south between
Laurel Canyon Blvd (on the west) and
Agnus Avenue (on the east). They shot the smoking scene at the
far north end of that alley, just south of Victory Blvd.
(In the photo above, we are looking west/southwest.)

- The weird
rabbit mural that you see behind the guys during the smoking
scene is located on an east-facing wall, on the west side of that alley.
It appears to be the back wall of "5150
Tattoo & Body Piercing" at 6336
Laurel Canyon Blvd. (That building also houses a check-cashing
place and an empty store that used to house a clothing store called "My
Twisted Clothing".)
* A tip of the hat
to Christian Jensen, who alerted me
to this rabbit mural location (and other locations in this chase) in Pineapple Express,
before I had even seen the movie. Thanks, Chris!
The small
door seen to the right of the rabbit mural (with a fake
"Beer & Wine" store sign over it) is the rear door to 6344
Laurel Canyon Blvd, which, in real life, houses "Ed Simon
Chiropractic".


- After smoking the weed, the kids exit
south down the same alleyway. Saul heads out the same way (to get
some food), just before the cop car
arrives.
That patrol car comes heading west
down a side alley, then turns south into the main alley and
parks there, across from Seth (who is smoking a joint next to the rabbit
mural on the west side of the alley).
In the photo above, we are looking
north, up the alley. The tall glass/mirrored
building you see behind them, at the north end of that alley,
currently houses CalNational Bank,
and its address is 6350 Laurel Canyon Blvd.,
at the SE corner of Laurel Canyon Blvd & Victory Blvd.



- As she is handcuffing Dale, the cop
turns Dale around to face the east. During this handcuff shot, we
can see another mural (a more abstract
one) behind him. (A close look reveals that it appears to include a psychedelic
octopus.) The camera is looking south at this point.
That abstract mural
is on the north-facing wall in the alley, the
rear wall of 6334 Laurel Canyon Blvd. (which, as of early 2009,
appears to be, appropriately enough, a head shop called "Dementia").


- The policewoman calls in about Dale,
to see if he has a record, and when she finds that there's a warrant out
on him, she radios in that she has him in custody.
Rosie Perez,
the crooked cop, is in her own police car when she hears this report come
over the radio. When we see her in her car, she is parked in a parking
lot of a shopping center called Valley Plaza,
near the southwest corner of the former Regal
Cinemas building (movie theatres), at 6355
Bellingham Ave. (just south of Victory).
As of 2009, the theatre building, like
many of the businesses in Valley Plaza shopping center, is empty, sitting
behind a chain link fence. They they filmed a good portion of the police
chase in that half-empty center.
The large billboard we glimpse behind
Rosie's cop car (in the photo above) sits atop an office building at 12226
Victory North Hollywood, that currently houses "Extreme
Rims".


- Just then, Saul
returns with some food, looks up the alley, and sees Dale getting
arrested. The camera is first looking south at Saul, and Saul is
walking east on the north side of Sylvan
Street, at the south end of the alley. When he sees Seth
being arrested, he's looking north up the alley (from Sylvan Street).

With Dale locked up in the back of
the patrol car, the cop car heads south down the alley, with the
policewoman talking to Dale about Rosie Perez, and not really paying attention
to where she's driving.
When she reaches the south
end of the alley (at Sylvan Street) Saul jumps out and
tries to stop the car. The cop car hits him, spilling his red Slurpies
all over the windshield.

- As the policewoman gets out of the
car to see what happened, and walks south around the car's east side,
Saul sneaks north long the car's west side, around the rear of the
car, then back south along the car's east side to sneak into
its driver's seat.

Saul then puts the cop car into reverse
and backs north up the alleyway,
with the policewoman threatening to shoot him.

- Just then, Rosie
Perez arrives in her own cop car, turning (from west to south)
into the north end of the alley,
and then heads south (in the alley)
towards Seth & Saul. The two car's collide in a rear-ender.

Saul then puts the car into drive and
heads back south down the alleyway. The south end of the alley (at
Sylvan Street) is blocked by the first
policewoman, who fires several shots at their (her own) car, before jumping
out of the way.
In the photo above, the cars
are heading south, and the police woman is aiming north (from
near Sylvan St.)
As he emerges from the south end of
the alley, a backing car causes Seth to swerve, knocking over paper racks
on the south side of Sylvan (near Re/Max),
then he turns right (west) on Sylvan
Street.




- Saul (with Seth still locked in the
back seat) speeds south down Laurel Canyon
Blvd, as Saul tries to kick out the windshield, and gets his
foot stuck in the windshield. (The camera is looking north/northwest up
Laurel Canyon.)
At the moment Saul's foot
breaks through the windshield, we see they are passing a Sizzler
restaurant. That's on the west side of Valley Plaza, at 6343
Laurel Canyon Blvd., on the west side of the street.
(That Sizzler is actually north
of RE-Max, a mild "cheat" on the part of the producers.)


They then continue that "cheat"
- with a shot (above) in which the cars pass that same
RE/Max for a second time, while still heading south.

- While driving south, swerving back
& forth over the center divider, with his foot still stuck in the windshield,
Saul passes a Gold's Gym. That gym
is located at 6233 Laurel Canyon Blvd,
on the west side of the Boulevard.


The Freeway
you see ahead of them during the chase is the Hollywood
(101) Freeway, where it crosses over Laurel Canyon Blvd.
(In the photo above, the camera is looking south.)


- After finally pulling his foot out
of the windshield, Saul hangs a sharp right
past a grassy park with trees.
He is actually turning
west onto Erwin Street (from the southbound Laurel Canyon Blvd.
The building on the right corner, with the green,
French-style roof, is at 6205 Laurel
Canyon Blvd, and (like many stores in this area) currently appears
to be empty (but previously housed a family counseling office).


- The grassy
park on the left acts as a landscaped side buffer agsinst the
Hollywood (101) Freeway, sheltering the Valley Plaza shopping center from
the freeway's northbound traffic. But iapparently, it's officially the
south end a park, named the Valley Plaza
Park (12240
Archwood St.),
a park that runs for quite a distance north,
along the side of the freeway.
They continue the chase, with Rosie
Perez driving west on Erwin Street, and the
guys driving the same direction, only across the park (Valley
Plaza Park), weaving through the trees.


- Saul then hits some kind of incline
and his car becomes airborne.
In the background, as they sail by
(heading north), you can see the back (west) side of "Bellagio
Furniture". Bellagio is at 6227
Laurel Canyon Blvd, and is right next door to (south of) the
Gold's Gym they just passed on their way south.
The road they sailed over is Vantage Avenue
(which is really just Erwin Street, renamed here as it curves into the
shopping center).


- The guys find themselves heading back
north through the parking lot of the Valley Plaza
Center, behind the row of buildings that houses Gold's Gym and
Bellagio furniture - WEST of Laurel Canyon Drive, and east of the Hollywood
Freeway.

- Seth tells Saul to do something, so
Saul (inexplicably) comes to a sudden stop.
When he does, Rosie Perez stops next to them, and uses the opportunity
to shoot at them, her bullets shattering
their passenger-side window.
They actually stop in front of a small,
free-standing building in that back parking lot, which housed a drapery
cleaning business (at 6240 Vantage Ave)
and the Valley Plaza station of the U.S. Postal
Service (at 6242 Vantage).
Both businesses appear to be currently closed.


- Saul takes off again. As they speed
across the parking lot (heading north), we can see a Sears
store in the distance. This Sears store isn't in the same lot
- it is actually located across a major street (to the north), at 12121
Victory Blvd.


- Just then, Rosie
Perez swerves to avoid a moving car, loses
control of her car, and smashes head-on into the rear of a parked
Cadillac, her own car becoming airborne and flipping over,. This scene
was staged just a few feet northeast of the intersection
of two small "streets" in the parking lot: Vantage Ave and Sylvan
Street.


More Pineapple
Express locations!

Some of the photos on this
page are stills from the DVD of "Pineapple Express"
(which you can buy by clicking
here) and are copyright Columbia.
The rest of the page is Copyright © 1999-2024-Gary Wayne / Seeing-Stars.com
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