Just rewatched this movie for the first time since 1981. Atlanta was not then the city it is today...CNN had barely launched and the airport (transformative)had just been renovated. No Goodwill Games yet. Mostly a dumpy downtown soon to be famous for Wayne Williams. Just curious if anyone knows why it was filmed there? Certainly would have made more sense in Boston, Chicago, NYC. Tax breaks from the film commission or source material?
shareMaybe because Burt is from Georgia.
shareThe author of the book Sharky's Machine, William Diehl, is from Atlanta, and thus set his novel in Atlanta...there you have it.
Whose idea was it for the word "Lisp" to have an "S" in it?
The book was based was based in Atlanta. And Burt Reynolds was the producer and director of the film. Why would you film a story based in Atlanta in Chicago?
shareSo every good story only takes place in Chicago, NYC, or Boston?
I'm not trying to be a rah-rah cheerleader for my hometown (I'm not that type), but I think Atlanta was a decent town in which to shoot a movie - even back then. If nothing else, it was a nice change-of-pace from the overused NYC, and the much-used Chicago and Boston.
Not every movie has to take place in some huge urban metropolis. I wouldn't have had any complaints, for example - if this movie or a similar movie had been shot in Portland, Oregon - or Denver, Colorado. "Purple Rain" was shot in the Minneapolis area in 1984 - any complaints about that?
It can be fun to look at a movie like Sharky's Machine and compare 1981 Atlanta to the current version. For example - at the very beginning of the movie, there is an aerial shot of Atlanta that includes the future CNN Center and the Omni. Just beyond those buildings is a gritty-looking industrial area (with railroad tracks and underpasses). If you panned over that exact same area today, you would see Philips Arena in the Omni's place - and the Georgia Dome and "Building C" of the Georgia World Congress Center in place of that run-down industrial area.
Btw - if by mentioning the Goodwill Games you are implying that the Goodwill Games were held in Atlanta - then you are mistaken. The Goodwill Games were never in Atlanta - IIRC, the only U.S. host cities of the Goodwill Games were Seattle and N.Y.C.. Perhaps you meant the Olympic Games?