Taken 2 Istanbul locations

BRYAN MILLS GOES TO ISTANBUL: TAKEN 2 FILMING LOCATIONS

The box office success of Taken in 2008 was too tempting and suggestive to ignore the possibility of giving Liam Neeson another chance to decrease the demographic of terrorists. In the words of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character from ‘True Lies’: They all were bad, so the challenge was to change the location from Paris to another large European city and make Bryan Mills face a couple of dozen ‘bad people’. In the second movie, the enemies were left the same: Albanian terrorists, particularly the father of a gang leader from the first movie, and his minions. This time, it is not Kim, but Bryan himself and his wife Lenore who were kidnapped, and the former CIA agent has no alternative but to hunt down and kill every man with a gun who tends to harm his family while they’re staying in Istanbul, Turkey. The second movie was shot in several months in late 2011 and early 2012 in the USA, Turkey, and France.

Filming in Istanbul took place in November 2011, and after the release a year later, it was badly criticized not so much for the quality of action, poor plot sequences, or shaky photography and directing, but for a questionable depiction of Turkey’s capital: its people and locations. The critics in the country of primary filming were so intense that the representatives of a local distributor faced the necessity to deal with thousands of complaints. They claimed that Turkey was depicted as an underdeveloped third-world country and Istanbul as a nursery garden for criminals and extremists, with dirty, shabby streets, police cars from the 1980s, and every single woman wearing chadors or their face veiled. The country is shown to have a border with Albania. 

Depicting someone’s home city may be sensitive, but people generally do not accept the cinematic rules and the plot sequence. In the first movie, Paris was shown as a dangerous place with prostitutes and pimps, armed migrants, kidnapping activity, corrupted law enforcement community, dark and harmful without fairy-tale images of a ‘Midnight in Paris’ kind. It is the ‘Taken’ concept to tell dark, dubious stories about dangerous people and unsafe locations, and obviously was not Luc Besson’s or Olivier Megaton’s alleged dislike of the city, like some critics claimed. The movie was not meant as a promo video for Istanbul, specially created for foreign money, and even the choice of the old car models for police was a part of the process to fit the needed atmosphere better. 

When it comes to the filming locations in Istanbul, except for several minor scenes, such as the car chase across the industrial zone, the absolute majority of scenes were filmed in the old historical center of the city, in the Fatih municipality, the destination point of 90% of tourists. Not all locations meant Istanbul itself as a panorama shot of the local Istanbul University worked for a governmental building in Tirana, the capital of Albania. More than that, the most significant proportion of scenes were filmed in the Eminönü district, within an area of just around 1 square kilometer, so they are easy to reach for movie enthusiasts. Eminönü worked for several districts of Istanbul, including the Asian part of the city. I visited Istanbul in 2015 and October 2020 and found all the key Taken 2 filming locations in Istanbul to share with you. 

 

WHERE WAS TAKEN 2 FILMED: PANORAMA OVER THE CITY 

It takes the movie eighteen minutes to shift the location from Los Angeles and Tirana (shot in Istanbul as well) to the ancient Constantinople. The bird’s eye panorama over the Golden Horn in the direction of the historical center is definitely one of the favorites among movie makers, maybe second after the flight over Grand Sophia and the Blue Mosque. For its opening shot in the city, Taken 2 chooses the 480 meters in length Galata bridge, the Eminönü pier area, and, of course, the magnificent Süleymaniye Mosque (Süleymaniye Camii), which has been dominating this landscape for four and a half centuries. The flying panorama lasts only six seconds but gives the audience a bit of an idea about Istanbul’s grandiosity. 

 

THE LOBBY OF THE ISTANBUL HOTEL

The camera flight over the Golden Horn gives way to a brief scene of Bryan and his clients in an impressive lobby of some of Istanbul’s hotels. A few moments later, the protagonist is surprised by the unexpected but delightful arrival of his ex-wife and daughter. They now occupy two suites with a magnificent view from the windows. Further down the story, Kim would have to avoid another kidnapping and use the city map to help her father determine his location.

The filming crew used the lobby of the Legacy Ottoman Hotel in the scene of a surprising encounter. This magnificent building was designed and created as far back as 1911 and nowadays offers 178 rooms with individual design. What should interest us is the window view, which, as it appears, was filmed in another location. 

Legacy Ottoman’s address is Hamidiye Cd. N16 in the Eminönü district is indeed now far from the New Mosque (Yeni Cami), which can be seen when Kim opens the window. The point is that the Hotel is situated in the opposite direction to the southeast of the Mosque, while the panorama we are shown captures Yeni Cami from the Western direction. It is easy to identify the direction when you pay attention to the position of the two minarets. In fact, the Northern part of the Legacy Ottoman Hotel can not simultaneously face the Golden Horn and the New Mosque. But there is more to come. When Kim leans out of the window of the suite, we can actually see the Legacy Ottoman Hotel in the right corner of the shot, thus we see the hotel she is supposed to be in. 

 

ON THE FERRY WITH A DAUGHTER

The first day in Istanbul brings joy to Kim, Lenore, and Bryan. The family spends time together. It is interesting to note that the actress Maggie Grace was already 28 years old during the filming of Taken 2, but she still pretends to be a naive school graduate. The scene in a nightclub is of little importance, while later on, the daughter and the father take a ferry ride. The direction of their move (from East to West across the Golden Horn with the Galata Tower in the background) suggests that they came back from the Kadıköy district in the Asian part of the city. The nature of such a decision is unclear, as they stayed in the most event-dense part of Istanbul and had no need to cross the Bosphorus for a night party. Anyway, it is delightful to see the two main characters relaxing and the daughter/father chatting. 

 

THE TERRORISTS COME TO ISTANBUL

At 23:52, we see the early morning panorama over the New Mosque, referring to the previous view from Kim’s window. We once again see the white building of the Legacy Ottoman Hotel on the right. The shot was taken from the building, approximately from the area of Ord. Prof. Dr. Cemil Birsel Cd Street is around 500 meters to the West of Legacy. A few minutes earlier, the alleged Albanian terrorists were shown crossing the Turkish border with no problems, though they had weapons in their cars. The supposed Albanian-Turkish (in fact, the two countries do not have a common border) access control looks like a XIX-century point and a sieve basket for criminals. The morning scene follows those cars across the shabby streets of Istanbul until they finally reach a temporary hide-out. 

While the greatest proportion of Taken 2 Istanbul was filmed in the Eminönü district, several scenes were set up approximately 2 kilometers to the West in the districts of Balat and Fener. Both parts of Istanbul have a long and colorful history. Fener was known for centuries as a center of the Greek diaspora in the Ottoman Empire and flourished until the rise of tension and conflicts between Turks and Greeks in the 20th century. Balat historically was the heart of Jewish life in Istanbul, starting from the 15th century. Both districts suffered the pogroms in the middle of the 20th century. After the indigenous population mainly left the area, Balat and Fener were accommodated by poor families from other parts of Istanbul, and migrants from other regions of Turkey, and in the second half of the last century, the area was infamous. The situation improved when UNESCO included Balat in the World Heritage List, and decades of paced renovation and commercialization followed. 

Both districts are known for their two and three-story buildings with terraces and balconies, and narrow ascending streets. Two years after Taken 2, the neighborhood was favored by the creators of ‘The Water Diviner’ with Russell Crowe and served as Istanbul after the First World War. Getting back to the Albanian terrorists, in one shot we can see a glimpse of the local dominant landmark: Phanar Greek Orthodox College, the red building built in the 19th century, but the educational institution in this place has been known for six centuries. 

 

CROSSING THE BRIDGE 

In the morning, Bryand and Lenore say goodbye to Kim and leave the hotel to see the city. They take a taxi and we see them crossing the famous Galata Bridge across the Golden Horn. We have already seen this landmark in the Istanbul opening panorama. The very first crossing on this place appeared as far back as the VI century during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I ‘The Great’, while the wooden predecessor of the modern bridge emerged in the XIX century. At the time, the passage across the Golden Horn was fee-based. The bridge experienced several restructurings with the fourth version built in 1912. It stood for eight decades but was badly damaged during a fire, and finally, in 1994, the modern version of the Galata Bridge took its rightful place. It has a length of 480 meters and a width of around 40 meters. It has two levels: one with the road, tram line, and wide pedestrian passages, and one accommodated by cafes and traditional fish restaurants. The Galata Bridge is famous for its fishermen who usually come here before sunrise, and many of them sell their catch to the local cafes. 

Let’s get back to the scene with Bryan and Lenore inside the taxi cab crossing the Galata Bridge. Problem number one with this panorama, or better to say, a peculiar detail, lies in the fact that the taxi car crosses the Golden Horn from North to South, thus in the direction of Eminönü district, where their hotel is supposed to be. We can assume that the characters visited some locations on the other bank before the scene, but the more clear explanation is a specific cinematic topography of Istanbul in the movie. The filming crew chose the locations mainly in Eminönü. The second detail that deserves attention is less noticeable. While the car is crossing the Galata Bridge, we see not only water but a blurred background with buildings and grass behind Lenore. Those backgrounds obviously came from other locations to allow the crew not to spend dozens of shots riding back and forth across the Golden Horn. 

 

SPLITTING UP

As I have stated above, the greatest proportion of the Taken 2 filming locations in Istanbul is restricted to the Eminönü district and the following kidnapping sequence as well. Modern Eminönü actually outlines the ancient borders of Constantinople. Being once hidden beyond the city walls, nowadays Eminönü is only a part of a large Fatih municipality and geographically only a tiny part of modern giant Istanbul. The area is squeezed by the Golden Horn in the North, and the Bosporus in the East and South. In the days of the Ottoman Empire, Eminönü remained a large cultural and commercial center. More than that, the northern part of the district still serves as a huge transport depot and hub, and the density of commercial shops and two legendary markets, the Grand Bazaar and Spice Bazaar, make the area a desired destination for shopping. 

Once Bryan notices the tail, he acknowledges the danger for himself, Lenore, and Kim (left in the hotel). He asks his ex-wife to leave the car and try to find a safe place. The chase sequence takes place in the streets of Eminönü, mainly in the commercially dense area to the South of the Eminönü pier and southeast of the new Mosque. In one of his interviews, Liam Neeson expressed his admiration for Istanbul and astonishment at just how indifferent local people and merchants could be during a working day, regardless of the movie filming process. According to particular shopping stores, it is easy to identify that filming took place at such narrow shopping streets as Tahtakale Cd, Sabuncu Hanı Sk, Çakmakçılar Ykş, and others in the area. In one shot, we can see a four-century-old building called Büyük Valide Han. 

 

BEING TAKEN TO THE HIDE-OUT

When both Lenore and Bryan are caught on the streets of Eminönü, the terrorists take them to a hideout that we supposedly saw a few scenes before. The following sequence serves as a reminder that our protagonist has special skills and, even with a bag on his head, Bryan Mills can remember the sounds and later match them with the topography of the route across the city. The first memorable location we can identify is the New Mosque. It was shown several times before in panorama shots taken from the hotel’s window. Yeni Cami is not as new as its name may sound: it was built back in 1665 on the site which had been previously occupied by the Jews. The New Mosque is one of the largest mosques in Istanbul, though it has only two minarets. The height of the central dome is 36 meters, and the total height is sixty-six. What is important for us is that the New Mosque is located in the Eminönü district next to the pier and the Galata Bridge. 

While Kim does her best not to be taken by the terrorists in the hotel, the car with her parents drives into a ferry. This is an important detail that means transportation to the Asian side of the Bosphorus. We have previously seen a brief ferry sequence with Bryan and Kim on the ferry. We should take into account that the actual location of the terrorists’ hideout is the area of Balat and Fener districts in the same European part of Istanbul as the hotel, the New Mosque, and the merchant area where Bryan and Lenore were taken. The movie makes us believe that the car is being taken to the other bank of the Bosphorus to the Kadıköy district. The ferries between these two parts of the city run every thirty minutes, and the journey takes around twenty minutes. Take this into mind as later on, Kim would find her parents in the area between Spice Bazaar and Grand Bazaar in Eminönü. 

 

KIM FLIPS THE SCRIPT

Once Bryan found a possibility to make a call to his daughter, he asked Kim to take a map of Istanbul and conduct a procedure to reveal his potential location. Kim sets a mark on the map in Eminönü in the European part of Istanbul, but it fits neither the Legacy Ottoman Hotel, where the lobby was filmed, nor the area from which one can see the panorama of the New Mosque shown earlier. Her marking is about the location of Rüstem Pasha Medrese, built in the mid XVI century. Then she draws another circle to the South of the first one in the area which has no locational correlation with anything we have seen before. Finally, Bryan claims that he and Lenore are in the area of the intersection of two circles. If we take a closer look at this supposed area on the map, we can see the historical heart of the European part, approximately around the famous Blue Mosque, Sultanahmet Park, and Ayasofya. Once again, the voiced locations do not correspond to the actual Taken 2 filming locations. 

Kim does not go to the area in the southern and central parts of Eminönü. We see her leaving the taxi car next to the New Mosque: the location we have previously seen numerous times. Getting back to the very beginning of this article, I stated that the greatest proportion of the film was shot in this area. The movie ignores one of the former scenes with the ferry going to the other bank of the Bosphorus. According to Bryan’s calculations, they did not leave Eminönü, and he is still at a distance from which he can hear the explosions. Getting back to Kim, she does not pay the taxi driver and finds her way to the roof of the nearest building. When she gets to the rooftop, we can clearly see the New Mosque in the background, which simplifies the identification of the roof: the pavilions of the Spice Bazaar or the Egyptian Bazaar. It should not be confused with the Grand Bazaar. 

The history of this old marketplace traces back to 1597 and the start of the construction, which lasted seven decades and was finished as late as 1664. Initially, the bazaar was a part of the complex of buildings of the New Mosque, the latter was even financed at the expense of the taxes from the market. The building of the L shape has six entrances or gates, and nowadays accommodates not only spice merchants but is also famous for its sweets. It is also known as an Egyptian bazaar because several centuries ago, the spices were generally delivered to Europe from Egypt through Turkey. Unfortunately, the building suffered two damaging fires in 1691 and 1940, and the latter resulted in the loss of some authentic architectural elements. It is interesting to know that before the 1940 fire, the bazaar was still connected with the New Mosque complex, and the road on which Kim leaves the car emerged only in the second half of the 20th century. 

Taken 2 was neither the first nor the only recognized film that was filmed around the area of the New Mosque and the Spice Bazaar in Istanbul. Several scenes of ‘The Accidental Spy’ (2001) were filmed in the city, and Jackie Chan’s character had to run across the bazaar without clothes after being attacked in the local baths. Several months after the filming process of Taken 2, the filming crew of Skyfall with Daniel Craig arrived in Istanbul to film the memorable chase sequence. One of the scenes was filmed on the square in front of the New Mosque when James Bond changed from the car to the motorcycle. 

 

BRYAN SAVES HIS DAUGHTER 

After getting to the roof of the Egypt (Spice) Bazaar, Kim throws another grenade, in fact, in one of the most people-dense places in the whole city, and fortunately, does not kill innocent people.  A few moments later, she uses another grenade and we can see another mosque, this time an XVIII century Nuruosmaniye Mosque. The issue with this shot lies in the fact that Kim had to cover a significant distance, around 700 meters on the straight and several kilometers theoretically across the roofs, to get to this location. More than that, there could be no uninterrupted rooftop route from the Spice Bazaar to the Grand Bazaar, near which the Nuruosmaniye Mosque is located. It is one of the most beautiful mosques in the style of Ottoman baroque. Finished in 1755, it was named Nuruosmaniye, which means ‘The light of the Ottoman’ after Sultan Osman III and due to 174 windows. Nuruosmaniye was the first mosque built in over a hundred years.  

Both Bryan and the terrorists hear the last explosion well, thus referring to the location around Grand Bazaar, one of the oldest and largest covered markets in the world, with a total area of around 30,000 m2 and up to half a million visitors daily. As it was revealed later, the filming in the area was a bit of a challenge for the filming crew of Taken 2. They used a helicopter for the bird’s eye shots, but with restrictions to keep enough distance from the buildings for safety reasons. The camera cranes were insufficient in the dense urban area around the Grand Bazaar. The crew finally mastered the usage of a small remotely piloted vehicle and the steady-cam technique to follow the actors. Apart from Taken 2, we can easily remember the chase scene from Skyfall, when Daniel Craig’s agent 007 rode on the roof of the market. 

Let us remember that Kim selected another area on the map, where the hideout of the Albanians was supposed to be somewhere on the Asian side of the city, and actually filmed in the Balat / Fener area. Taken 2 has its own cinematic Istanbul topography, which works badly with the actual one. Kim finally notices the smoke that Bryan had made to identify his and Lenore’s location among repetitive roofs. The former CIA agent uses the gun and leaves the improvised confinement, while Kim jumps from one roof to another like Jason Bourne. For just a few seconds, we see the Topkapi Palace in the background, meaning Kim happens to be on the other side of the Golden Horn, a few kilometers from the area of Nuruosmaniye: a significant teleportation in just a few seconds. 

 

HEADING FOR THE US EMBASSY

After the reunion, Bryan and Kim steal a local taxi. He sets a timer for five minutes, enters the coordinates of the US embassy into the navigator, and goes for Lenore. Now, Kim would ride the car, evidently, to add tension to the upcoming car chase across the streets of Istanbul. The characters perform another teleportation to the European side of the city and face the police car, which was ordered to go to the previously mentioned Balat area. For the first time, the real filming location of the hideout is mentioned, though the characters are still supposed to be somewhere in Eminönü. The police department of Istanbul lent both assistance and control over the filming process back in late 2011 when the chase scene was filmed. Most of the people we see in the film on the streets are not extras but local people who were sometimes indifferent, and sometimes curious about the process. 

Kim finds a way for the car across narrow streets with washing lines and garbage cans. According to the look of the surrounding area, this sequence was filmed again in the Balat / Fener area, a few kilometers West of the location of the Grand Bazaar. After a short section of chase in an industrial area after losing a tail with the help of a train, Bryan and Kim finally had to cover the last few hundred meters left to reach the US embassy. Evidently, another instance of teleportation occurred as there is no industrial area in the Eminönü of such kind and it would take them to cross the Bosphorus and more than an hour of riding to find such one. The filming crew turned one of the beautiful gates of the University of Istanbul into the alleged gates of the embassy. The thin metal of a taxi car magically saves the two from a large-caliber machine gun and half a dozen guns. 

This scene was filmed at the street called Prof. Dr. Sıddık Sami Onar Cad., named after a famous Turkish lawyer, one of the founders of the modern Turkish judicial system. Siddik Sami Onar was the rector of the University of Istanbul. It is important to note, that the car rode next to the wall of the Süleymaniye Mosque, once the last mosque in the city. Built in 1557 under the iconlike Ottoman ruler Suleiman the Magnificent, it has four minarets and a dome 53 meters high.  

After getting his daughter to a safe place, Bryan once again leaves to save his ex-wife Lenore. It is not clear whether the Albanians had two hideouts or if the movie just uses its character to find the location he had already known about. Bryan recreates the initial route when his head is covered with a sack. We can see the New Mosque and the Spice Bazaar one more time. Then, Bryan takes a ferry to cross the Bosphorus, thus meaning his journey to the Asian part of Istanbul. We even see the building of the Chamber of Commerce (İstanbul Ticaret Odası), which is located close to the New Mosque, and the Legacy Hotel mentioned before. In fact, such a perspective with Liam Neeson standing facing the Eminönü was more understandable on the way back. Anyway, in the next scene, the movie once again shows us the Balat / Fener area with no glimpse of the opposite bank of the Bosphorus. Finally, Bryan finds Lenore and kills every ‘bad guy’ on his way. The movie ends with an epilogue back in Los Angeles.