HOME ALONE FILMING LOCATIONS 33YRS LATER

all right what's up guys uh so I am currently in Chicago for a just a brief weekend trip I'm in O'Hare Airport a crisp 29° quite the contrary from Texas and I just wanted to show the air the area of the airport because this is where Home Alone was filmed it was actually filmed right inside those doors past the security area which I cannot access I already asked and they uh denied me I have to have a boarding pass for American Airlines to enter this area that I wanted to show you right now uh yeah you can't so for future reference if you want to see this spot where the f the the uh maish just run through the terminal to get to their uh gate you have to be at Terminal 3 and you fly through American Airlines so on that note I've got to catch my shuttle so I can get to my rental car and start the day here we are yep it's the Grand Food Center this is Kevin's grocery store this is where he shops for his Necessities his food items that he needs around the house and milk and honestly I don't even remember what else he got here and it looks like if you look closely you can see some snow flurries how cool is that Bring it on I want the snow actually make my pictures and my videos look that much more better more better is that other word make my pictures look that much better please snow can you see it yeah there it is exciting stuff all right so I'm inside the store and I'm matching up trying to find where Kevin gets milk and it looks like this is the aisle basically where the milk is at today um the coolers are obviously more uh updated than they were back then actually they wasn't didn't even have doors back then but uh you can see just a little further back you can see Kevin come around the corner here and this door has a like a Christmas gift wrapping um there like paper around it I believe that's the door he comes this way looking for milk and he ends up finding it exactly where the milk is today on the very end of the aisle so this way and the caran this way and he grabs the milk boom I was looking for some Toy Soldiers uh for the kids but there there's none to be found there's none inside but I did find the um the candy aisle the geographic uh the walk that Kevin would have taken from the in entry to the store directly to the left is accurate I'm going to try to show you without being very obvious about filming inside the store cuz I didn't really ask ahead of time and that always kind of like raises eyebrows so uh so here I'm going to show you in sort of slow motion the the route that Kevin would have taken if he was shopping in Real Life coming into the store all the way to the left he goes to the left which uh this aisle here coming up again slowly because I'm in slow motion here the yogurt aisle and today but as he's making now right onto this aisle the very end corner is where the scene picks [Music] [Music] up so I just asked one of the employees they said that the uh the the Checker is either uh this one or that one like more in the center that way so it's one of these two uh I'm trying not to point the camera VI but you can actually see the this in the background which was the where the meat market is the meat area yeah I think it's that one right there now that I think about it it's it is uh one 1 2 3 four it's that one because it's facing the uh the employees to the left right there and um you can see the meat the what do they call The Butchery has changed quite a bit the the uh the the Walling back there but you can see the bend in the the wall there in the background for the Checker that Kevin is checking out at so it's this one straight to the left right there okay so taking the video outside of the store this is what the the front looks like um the storefront it's the Grand Food Center in WKA and here I was having some audio problems with the wind uh it was killing my audio and I was basically saying how perfect is this now that you know I'm here and I'm coming out of the store and it's now starting to snow and I wanted to uh show the parking lot just kind of give you my thoughts of my experience inside because it's a little awkward trying to film in a functioning business that is pretty busy trying to work around customers and you don't want to interrupt the business so I'll play the rest of the clip kind of explaining what was going on in there I don't like to um blatantly point my camera at uh business going going on um customers staff unless I get permission to do so and and I wasn't going to be here very long I didn't want to ask for permission because I wasn't going to be here very long I wanted to see the store inside for myself where did I park kind of get the bearings figure out which aisle it's a short scene it's a lot shorter than I remember which aisle he parked I mean which aisle he came around the corner for milk check out that snow though there it is that's my reent oh what do you know it's a it's from Canada Canada plate anyway I wasn't going to be in there very long so I didn't want to be pointing my camera around and just disrupting things I don't like that feeling so I did confirm that the um I think it's uh Checker 4 the one that you would think the one the exact one that you would think uh that Kevin would check out at it's that one but my footage shows the the what it looked like today and then that background that you see and the where the meat market is The Butchery uh it matches the the way it turns it curves the wall it matches it just the entire store has been updated over the years so obviously it's been what 30 years now since filming but um yeah that was it I did not want to bother with it was starting to get busy when I was checking out but I didn't want to bother with um getting my picture where Kevin was and all that it's I can go either way but um that's it Grand Food centor and WKA we don't see the exterior and according to Kevin after he's asked if he's alone where's his mom Fam I'm 8 years old you think i' would be here alone I don't think so where's your mom my mom's in the car she's in the car so in a sense Katherine O'Hara his mom would be in the parking lot like like so in a sense think about it and I forgot where where he say his dad was where's your father he's at work anyway his mom is in the parking lot okay moving on so let's let's let's do this let's retrace Kevin's steps so he just came from the store down that way well in reality he's coming back to his house he come this way and his house is on this side so he's going to cross the street and he's now going to be put on this sidewalk now when he's coming down the sidewalk to our right look watching the screen and to his left is the tree let's not that one and I'll I'll tell you why in just a second we're going to back up I'm going to stop at the tree Kevin's tree Kevin's grocery bag busting tree coming up to your right of your screen right now three two one en Vision Kevin there's the tree right there and I'm going to tell you why so now obviously I could be wrong cuz I I literally spent 30 seconds in finding this tree we're going to go with it geographically it makes sense this would be Kevin's walk right and it just it just makes sense it's a good filming spot overall production wise proximity to the house from the store all of it just makes sense and I'll tell you so here's the clip there's a screenshot the clip look at this Bend I call it a bend in the tree here now there's also snow in the scene as well there's more snow in the scene but you can see how the the lip or whatever you want to call this little indention there you you go and the tree is there and you see it in the movie too now I don't know if it's that angle or this angle I'm going to look review the clip and check again and you can see how the snow goes up and it it kind of goes into this indention there I'm going to go with that I could be wrong but the other thing I was going to point out is there are no more trees before he reaches his house which is right there so how cool is it that it's snowing I mean come on it couldn't have been more perfect in March in March I didn't think it was going to I mean I guess it's kind of normal over here but this is perfect this is this is what I wanted for this trip and I'm only here 2 days I'm standing on ke on the mallister Street Lincoln Avenue in WIA and it's snowing and I'm capturing it and there's the house come come on you can't get any better only better it could get is if it got really if there was a blizzard and got really there's like 3 ft of snow or something to kind of really set the scene but I'll take this so I'm going to get this let's hold this shot we'll bring in Kevin one more time there he is you know what I just noticed something and I wasn't paying attention before there is no other tree in the background and that's the tree I was going for this tree is clearly in the background and looking at the movie clip there is none this tree does work and I'm actually thinking now that this is the tree cuz for one it's a big detail there's no tree in the background and if you if you add some snow to the corner of that tree right there it can look very similar to what we see in the movie the background blur let me get my cinematic mode out and see if I can match it here we go so let's focus on the tree now we got a blurred background or sort of a blurred background yeah I think I want to go with this tree so if for any of you paying attention and you do visit the spot and you want to find Kevin's grocery bag busting tree it's going to be the first one from the turn from the left turn on Lincoln I don't recall the name of this street but you you you you ride down it when you leave Grand Food Center you come up to the stop sign you make a left on Lincoln and it's this first street I mean sorry it's this first tree right there I mean honestly either one can work if you really want it to but for background accurac accy this one matches better there you go the one thing the one other thing I do want to not is that you do not see their their their background is extremely depth of fi the f- stop is it's pretty low so you don't see any of buildings like houses and you do see the house and my shot but um I also don't have the camera and lenses that they use using for the movie so this is the best it's going to get you know what guys while editing this I while we watch me reenact the um I still feel like this is up can be up for debate the first tree makes the most sense because there is no other tree obviously behind it just like in the movie shot you do not see a tree behind it but like I said you know their background is EXT extremely blurred you can't even see the house or make out much of what their background shows the other thing is if it is the second tree it could be just angled enough to where that first tree is directly behind the second so you can't even see the first tree so it could be hidden behind that second tree the second tree the shapes the the indention in the trunk it matches more of the movie but for photographic reasons while you're visiting the area I would say get your shot at the first tree as soon as you make a left on to Lincoln which is the one that I ended up going with for my reenactment but it would not surprise me if it is the second tree so it's still kind of I'm on the fence still I don't know what do you what do you guys think it doesn't have to be that big of a debate but I I'm curious and um yeah let me know what you think in the comments the first tree or the second tree we're going to move on to why this house is so famous oh this street is so famous and that is the mallister house you know I got to admit so home well we say this I'll start off with this home alone is a is one of my favorite movies of all time for a number of reasons but I'll just say the main reason is Nostalgia uh I was about Kevin's age I think I'm about a year two younger than M caulin and that kid was an idol to me I wanted to be mcoi culen especially when you got a little older and Richie Rich and whatnot I know don't laugh but uh so watching Home Alone and seeing this cool thing this little kid would do um obviously it's a movie but I would just marvel in that and uh this house was just a I mean I knew one one once time I came in adult I got into phone location I knew this would be a spot that I would eventually get to I just didn't know when I get to Chicago and I'm finally here 39 years old in 2022 I finally made it to the mallister house now obviously uh the rod iron gate was not there at the time A lot has changed honestly it's a smaller looking house in person than it was um in the movie it's a big house but it's just smaller and uh so they had a driveway and this has been explained already I'm sure on YouTube countless of times but they had a driveway that went in that way and sto there and cuz that's how the little Nero pizza guy you know he hits the the stat statue the the iron statue whatever it was he hits it I think it's like looks like a like a caesar Little Caesar guy anyway he hits the statue there uh so it's so cool I I don't want to like go on into a whole monologue about home alone but just the the way it's filmed the it's aesthetic it's got that '90s something about '90s movies and they just they make you feel like you're there and and and this is this is definitely one of them that that did that for me so right there uh family comes out the van to take him to the airport it was right pulled right in there um a couple other things I do want to bring up while I'm here before I get closer to the house is this house right here is where if I'm not mistaken I think this is the house that the wet Bandits turn um leave the faucets running they do their signature thing I think it's this house or it's this house I'm drawing a blank and again I did not watch the movie before it's one of these two now I'm starting to think it's this house and uh I'm sure one of y'all will correct me but I want to correct myself that's why I'm pointing out both time both now I'll probably correct myself in editing but this I think is the is the house they leave the faucets running and that's how they get their their monitor the wet bandits in this house here this is the one because of the drive way is when Cav's coming down the sidewalk and the the truck is coming out at the same time and they had that really cool how they did it was a reverse shot it's a really cool reverse shot of a little um Co hulken right here and the van is coming down the sidewalk and is about to meet with him his face got really close to his face need that don't tell me what to do okay I can do it if I want to hey not sick hey watch out hey hey you got to watch out for traffic son you know just like that right there now I didn't look at the clip before this I'm just kind of spitballing that but yeah they did that with a reverse obviously that's the old movie trick you know they they reverse they film it they do the action in reverse and then they yeah reverse the the footage to to make it seem it went that way we don't need that c don't tell me what to do okay I can do it if I want to not sick hey watch out hey hey you got to watch out for traffic son you know sorry Merry Christmas yeah those are the two houses and of course the other house which I guess is the more famous or just as maybe just as famous as a mallister one second famous is uh the old man's house Christmas this house literally to the left of the mallister house to your right of your screen to the right of your screen right there now we don't see a lot of this house cuz it's it's it's got a lot of snow in the yard you know it's really fascinating seeing this in person because again and and you you you hear this a lot and uh I say it a lot I'm sure and when you go and visit filming locations in person you probably experience this a lot yourself but the stuff is a lot smaller scale in person and the reason why what I want to point out by by uh by saying that is um I just remember like the windows that the kids are looking out at I felt like they were the house was just taller you know like it was higher I felt like the windows were spread out more they're right next to each other and that that's that's it you know and now where was the shot I don't know it probably could have been in the yard which I'm not going to go on to any of these proper that's where the kids would have been looking out of the window and they're looking at old man Marley and all he's doing is shoveling snow off his lawn off of his sidewalk which you don't see because it's covered in snow but old man Marley would have been um so you I think you kind of see him come out this way but the the shot starts maybe around this area and he comes this way and the the the main marker is the tree I think the cisters and just just arrived home they sure did I pointed my c i I didn't realize I thought they were another another visitor that's the actual owners of the house just pulled up in that hummer that Jeep or whatever the it is um and then the owner for old man Marley's leaving now so ain't that something I might have to put the camera down for a second in case they talk to me okay I had to take a break and warm my hand it's biting cold out here I don't have any gloves so uh the real life mallister just returned home and the real life Marley old man Marley and his family just left so anyway but back to what I was saying the kids are looking out for that window and they're it's at night and they you know a bus is telling this creepy like this scary fical story about old man Marley killing his victims and he put salt on the bodies or something some like that but um oh there's a lift driver right there I guess dropping somebody off at the this is a lot lot of a it's a lot a lot of action going on at house today but anyway what I was saying is old man Marley uh the one reference oh maybe okay it's just it's another another couple of visitors but he happens to be a lift driver anyway a lot of distractions the one reference that you had in the old man Marley shot is this tree which is kind of weird cuz it seemed so far away from the house in the movie but it's uh yeah I don't know you I I'll show you the clip and I think the obviously the angle is from the the the Viewpoint of the the the the boys which I'm not going to get but it's kind of like this and old man Marley standing right next right there by the tree so looks like the sticky Bandits are back we're the wet Bandits it's our calling card and now they're disguised as hooked up electronic audio and TV surround sound theater home theater room uh install company and they're casing the place out right now so oh they got access how cool would that be if you had a job a work order that brings you to the mallister house you're about to do some some electronic install in the mallister house that'd be the best day on the job for me but yeah the uh angle how we'll get on grass here is kind of like that you don't have that in the shot like that and old man Marley got right there check it out old man Mar so anyway I'm going to get my STS and we're going to go ahead and get out of here it's been a lot of time already you ever heard of the South Bend shovel slamer no that's him [Music] there you go this is the church from Home Alone uh the exterior the exterior only of the church the church that Kevin uh he there's a scene where he's running across it I think that's like an um a montage of I say a montage but he's they rushing back home I guess to to set the traps up and uh you see a moment of him running across the the the front ear of the church I'm distracted by what's in front of me cuz I don't see much of this back in Texas uh we got plenty of it last winter during that crazy winter storm but none this year so this is always nice to see you know probably people in the north Northeast are probably like what you why you saying this but it's always nice for me to see snow every now and then but anyway I digress back to the home alone church this is pretty much the angle that you see I guess it's across the street too I don't remember and um right here right in that area is where they had the activity scene uh the nativity set of characters and statues there uh where let's get closer but anyway the Nativity area is pretty much where that sign is yeah cuz I remember it's directly below this window here so Kevin would have been right here negativity scene I look back at the screenshot I did want to get the angle right and it's it's pretty much about right here cuz you can see a little bit of the sidewalk but they have that that background pull pulled in so for accuracy sake depth of field sake we're going to pull it in a little bit you can see the that's pretty much the angle you can see the tree to the right um but of of course it's it's it's grown out more into the this part of the frame but of course that sign wasn't there but uh yeah that's it that's it that's the church not going to go in because it doesn't it's not the inside of the church that we see in the movie but uh it's cool to finally be here I've always wanted to to come to Home Alone Town Home Alone land in the suburbs of Chicago but I won't be doing all the spots of course that's going to be it for this spot I'm going to get some some Steals and move [Music] on all right so this brings us to the end of the video uh again I did not seek out all the locations for home alone I was just in the area for for like a weekend but this brings us to hubard Woods Park now you might recognize this as a familiar area because it is it's this is the the park that Kevin runs into after he steals the toothbrush from the pharmacy store and he goes sliding down the ice running away from the cop and um he gets away right so that park right behind me um is where that happens it takes place but I was a little hesitant to show this this footage and I'll tell you why so as you might know I do my own research to get correct addresses and coordinates to these locations before I go out there and and document them put them out on the internet for all to see well this is one of those instances where the information that I gathered from a source was incorrect what you're looking at is what I thought was the former Pharmacy in Home Alone that Kevin steals a toothbrush from and the resource the source that I used online was atlas of Wonders and I've used atlas of Wonders before and I've had no issues uh in this case they led me astray and I'm a little embarrassed by it um and to this day it's still listed incorrectly they have it listed as 976 Green Bay Road and um W go when in fact the actual storefront is on the other end of the park at 940 Green Bay Road so at first when I got when I got back and I and I I realized this by comparing my pictures to others and realizing that I'm mine was different when I was there I I was like this this looks you know I I I I'm I'm trusting The Source I'm like I'm I'm you know I'm looking at I me I'm documenting it I'm I'm I'm I'm making comparison the brick looks the same the windows looks the same and I'm just like deducing everything to you know time changing uh the the any differences that I see today is just the the the cause of time right well uh there's obvious changes to the the side of the building it just doesn't match right I mean even you can go across the street and you go right into the park it looks like that that's where Kevin would go right into the park well that's just the other end of the park it's not the exact end it's not it's it's not it's just not where the scene was shot it's on the other end on the south I believe it's the south end so this is the correct Park it's just not where yeah it's just not where the scene was shot so I'm showing you the footage for the sake of me having it but everything that I'm saying here this is with me thinking that I have the right information that I'm I'm in the right spot and I'm wondering at the time I'm talking about like the trees that he's going he's zigzagging in and out like where are they like they're not I I couldn't make sense of the the trees and and what we know were are they gone they take it to another part of the tree of the park you know because there's Cuts all over the the sequence so it all makes sense now I'm now I'm walking toward the correct part of the of the park see that corner that is where it it's shot so again you know this happens every now and then I'm a little embarrassed but like I said I I I I have this footage I didn't want to just throw it out and never use it so um this is the park this is where it happened I am walking the correct direction these trees here are not these three from the film unfortunately they're on the far end of the opposite end of the park that I never ended up getting to so I'll go ahead and allow the rest of this clip play out because I do accurately explain Kevin's Escape across that bridge coming up here in the end I hope U the audio is not being destroyed by the wind an ice R decides to slide through the the traffic of the the skaters and of course he's got a heavy set cop that can't keep up and um it works for him he slides I think he ends about right here and you can see this building in the background never that that opening so I think so they cut here because the scene the chase scene is cut here the cop realizes he's he's not going to catch up to this eight-year-old kid and then we have a shot I want to say if it's geographically correct gonna be over here yes yes because Kevin comes from over there and he's see I love when they do it when they when they continue the the geographical path when they do cuts instead of taking it to somewhere else you know miles away they continue the real life path and now we as an audience don't see this we get a different angle but Kevin continues to run through here and through that way that pathway like which is a bridge right and so we're going to show that bridge here but we get the cut after he slides and now we've got this camera angle which is showing this this View and we're like why are we seeing this where C where did it go and the camera kind of I think it pans a little bit like that and that's when you see little Kevin he's just finishing his run right there so cool so that's the uh cinematography the we chose for the the the the button scene mean you know the ending the scene up and um it's pretty cool that's the bridge let's go ahead and walk it I mean when and WKA right I've never been to Wi it's my first time probably be my only time and God knows how long I mean if I if I ever come back this is a group trip I'm going to bring I want to bring some other location friends and to do all the Home Alone locations one day but then again it's like everybody's done home alone you know you've you've already seen a home alone location video and you've seen some really like some um what do you call it a just an all-inclusive One-Stop shop Home Alone video where they did they covered it right so it's like what what what am I going to add to that what am I going to bring that's new but um this is really cool though so Kevin's running down here I wonder if this is a working track doesn't look like it it looks like everything's kind of abandoned it's got an abandoned fi this is a cool shot [Applause] though yeah Kevin escapes through here where does he go though I forget what what scene do we go to [Music] next I'm a criminal this is how this is where Kevin Escapes in real life he's probably told to cut right about here Chris Columbus says Matt cut he probably didn't say mac but he probably said cut Kevin Kevin cister Little M culin goes back that way probably do another take I how many takes it took this is he would have escaped down he might have slipped and bust his ass here if it was snowing he had a bunch of rocks there to for traction really cool just a really cool area I mean it it screams movies you that's one thing I've noticed when I uh visit these these areas the that that that are predominantly used for filming passing into California um this place the Wilmington Albuquerque um well LA and New York are obvious ones but those you know these these smaller towns um they're so picturesque you they're they're when you get when you get there it's it's like you're own it's like you're on a live set this is a sad well especially when nothing nothing seemed change this this that shot over there from over there you know that shot from over there this way looks pretty much identical from what I remember CN CNN y w reading that right hovered Woods there you have it Kevin steals a toothbrush and escapes this way I kind of wanted to recreate that shot as me of as of me as Jimmy pointing shoplifter but man I would have been quite the spectacle so that brings us to the end of my home alone locations video the the the locations that I actually had to show to you and I hope you enjoyed I I don't know how thorough I was uh I don't know what I left out I mean obviously um O'Hare Airport I did OB I did land in O'Hare and I did leave uh out of O'Hare as well but like I said in the intro of the video you have to fly American Airlines into Terminal 3 to see the area that was shot uh in the movie it's just that's just the way it is it's it's completely off limits to U Terminal 3 only and American Airlines is the only airport that flies into that terminal so uh yeah yeah cuz I tried trust me I tried um other than that there are um I'm sure there's some other spots but I can't think of um them right off the top of my head but this was a a weekend trip I was there for uh an event on a Saturday night I had other locations I was there all day on Saturday I had the event on Saturday night and I flew out Sunday if I remember correctly this is like already a year and a half ago this is how long I sat on this footage so um but I figured it's Christmas time I missed last year I'll go ahead and upload this year um but here it is and I mean I had other locations I did as well in the Chicago area that I'll I'll make another uh uploads for you but this was my my home alone Adventure so did the best I could hopefully it was entertaining and I brought something a little different to the plethora of other Home Alone location videos but I'll end the ramble here thanks again for watching and uh stay tuned for the for the rest again I appreciate you guys' support for those that still stick around thanks [Music] again

Channel: Adam Was Here

Views: 2,541

Keywords: home alone, home alone movie, christmas movies, christmas classics, 90s movies, macaulay culkin, kevin mccallister, filming locations, filming location, winnetka il, winnetka, chicago il, chicago, movie locations, movie location, john hughes, chris columbus, catherine ohara

Id: V32bjfmcxeM

Length: 42min 22sec (2542 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 19 2023