[Groceteria]

We've done this topic before on the old message board, but I thought it might make a nice ongoing discussion here as well. Which movies have featured noteworthy location shots of old supermarkets?

I'll start with these, in no particular order:

• -- The Odd Couple (1968): Bohack store in Manahttan.
  -- The Stepford Wives (1975): both a Grand Union and a Waldbaums on Long Island.
  -- Raising Arizona (1987): former Safeway.
  -- Bullitt (1968): Marina Safeway in San Francisco.
  -- Mother, Jugs, and Speed (1976): Lucky in Santa Monica (Lincoln Boulevard).
  -- Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974): Save-Mart in Sonora CA.
  -- Singles (1992): Food Giant (now the Wallingford QFC) in Seattle.
  -- The Best of Everything (1959): Vons in LA area (maybe Broadway-Crenshaw Center).
  -- The Only Game in Town (1970): Vegas Village, Las Vegas.
  -- The Blues Brothers (1980): Jewel, somewhere near Chicago.
  -- Petulia (1968): Cala Foods on California in San Francisco.

A few TV shots as well:

• -- Brady Bunch: Mayfair Market in Hollywood.
  -- Streets of San Francisco: Marina Safeway in San Francisco (two different episodes), Safeway at Seventh and Cabrillo, Safeway at 24th and Castro, QFI at Seventh and Clement.
  -- Monk: Beachs in SoCal.
  -- Magnum PI: Safeway, presumably in Hawaii.

I'll try to come up with more...

[wnetmacman]

In Steel Magnolias (1989): Brookshire's #29, Natchitoches, LA. Although the store since received a different, brighter decor package, it still has the same floorplan as in the movie. The decor package at that time was very typical of their stores.

[GatorDon]

In the move Parenthood with Steve Martin when Keanu Reeves and his girlfriend are picking up their pictures there is a classic 50's style Publix store in the background. This was the predominate storefront until the late 60's.

[jamcool]

Here's one that pops up on AMC once in awhile



http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bachelor_in_paradise/

Bachelor In Paradise (1961) - OK Bob Hope movie with scenes in an LA-area Hughes supermarket.

From some of the scenes in the store - apparently Hughes was an IGA affiliate in the early 60s' - there were several posters in the store with prominent IGA logos!

[GatorDon]

Got another one....
The shopping center in Edward Scissorhands is the Publix Southgate shopping center in Lakeland Florida. The storefront has changed but the massive Southgate sign is there to this day.

[Daniel]

The Jewel store in The Blues Brothers was in the Dixie Square Mall in Harvey, Il. The mall had been closed down for about a year by the time the movie was made, so the Jewel store you see in the movie was the front part of a JC Penney store when the mall was actually open. Jewel did operate a store in the mall (Along with a Turn-Style discount store) when it was open, but the actual store had no mall access and wasn't used in the movie.

The movie "My Blue Heaven" has a grocery store scene in it, but I haven't been able to figure out what store it was supposed to be. There's also a shot of a Hughes store in "Your Three Minutes Are Up", something I had to screen as the all night movie at my former employer!

Signs for Shopping Bag, Hughes, and Alpha Beta often pop up in various episodes of Dragnet and Adam-12, but they're just in the background most of the time.

[todd]

Winn Dixie always seems to show up in movies set in the deep south (but not for long I don't guess ...or at least now they'll be abandoned stores), like "Fried Green Tomatoes" and of course, "Because of Winn Dixie."

[kg4peq]

I can't remember what movie I was watching, but about a year ago I was sitting in front of the TV and there was a supermarket scene in a movie. Well, I realized my passion for supermarket history and architecture might be going a bit far when I mumbled, "I bet that's a Safeway" upon seeing the electric rotary checkstands and brown & beige color scheme. I paused the DVR, flipped through it frame by frame, and sure enough, there were Lucerne brand products on the counter!

[Phil53]

The movie "My Blue Heaven" has a grocery store scene in it, but I haven't been able to figure out what store it was supposed to be.

I just found out from a local newspaper that the grocery store and plaza was filmed in Laguna Lake Plaza, San Luis Obispo, CA on 1314 Madonna Road.

They said it used to be a "Williams Brothers" Supermarket. But I can't Google what Williams Brothers was and when it became a now remodeled Albertsons.

Can anybody tell me what Wiliams Brothers was and when did they merge?

[Edric Floyd]

Adding to the list.

I know I have seen some Ralph's markets or logos in many California based movies. Only one I know for sure is the mid 1970's disney movie "Gus". The scene where they are chasing a horse through a supermarket.
But having never been to CA I have no idea where it is.

Also look for Ralphs, Mayfair, Lucky or Shopping Bag (dont know if that one is real) stores in various episodes of "Chips" and "The Rockford Files" usually if any of the characters are in the parking lot of a store. BTW: does anyone know what store James Garner is in when pictured in the opening sequence of "The Rockford Files"?

There is a VON'S truck unloading into a store in a background during a car chase scene in the movie "Cleopatra Jones" (1973) And a FINAST truck parked in front of a store in the movie "Shaft" (1971) You can't tell the actual buildings but I remember several FINAST stores around the NYC area in the 1970's.

"Married to the Mob" (1988): FoodTown, Pathmark and ShopRite. All in the New York City/Long Island area.

On the "Odd Couple" TV show you may see an exterior shot of Felix walking out of a GRISTEDE'S market in Manhattan.

"Claudine" (1974) You see a Grand Union store in the background when "Claudine" played by Diahann Carroll is riding the city bus through Harlem in the first few minutes of the movie. You also see a Grand Union store in the background in "Saturday Night Fever".

And on a few episodes of "The Sopranos" you may see grocery shopping inside a PathMark. And in the 2004 season you hear mention of Grand Union and the fact that Grand Union had closed down. Of course with The Sopranos taking place in New Jersey, PathMark is based in NJ and Grand Union was based there and was one of largest chains in the state right up to its demise a few years ago.

[romleys]

There used to be 3 Williams Bros. supermarkets in Northern California. One was in a former Safeway (1125 Park St. Alameda, CA), one was in a former Louis Store (4100 Peralta Blvd. Fremont, CA), and one in a former Russell's Market (4364 Piedmont Ave. in Oakland, CA). While I doubt this might be the same Williams Bros. chain I do know that in the 1960's the company stated it was looking to expand rapidly.
Charles H. :)

[danielh_512]

In the new "War of the Worlds", you'll notice a bag of groceries with a box of cereal. You can pick up a Stop N Shop label on one of the boxes at the top. Nice attention to detail being that the movie was set in NJ outside of NYC.

[storeliker]

Everytime a remake of something comes out I have to watch the original and as you know alot of remakes coming out including a Batman redo with first movie already out on video.
Well being on Netflix I relutancly ordered the original Bad News Bears to watch first. They havent sent remake yet but shocked at racial slurs and handing out beer to kids at end in the original. So much I forgot since seeing it when I was six when it first came out.
Anyway the original seemed like it was filmed all at the same field somewhere in SOuthern California. At the playoffs in the end there are two shots real quick of an old style Ralphs sign and the Ralphs building directly behind it. I am wondering if anyone from SOuthern california knows where this is.
Also am curious which stores in videos I found at launch.com were filmed. "Push It" by Garbage and "Mono" by Courtney Love
The only others that I would like to know is where the grocery store scenes were filmed in the original and remake of "The Stepford Wives"

[Daniel]

The original Stepford Wives was filmed in a Grand Union (You can read the sign very clearly). Not sure about the remake since I never saw it.

[Safewayfan]

I can't remember what movie I was watching, but about a year ago I was sitting in front of the TV and there was a supermarket scene in a movie. Well, I realized my passion for supermarket history and architecture might be going a bit far when I mumbled, "I bet that's a Safeway" upon seeing the electric rotary checkstands and brown & beige color scheme. I paused the DVR, flipped through it frame by frame, and sure enough, there were Lucerne brand products on the counter!

I think you're talking about the 1987 Martin Short and Dennis Quaid comedy "Innerspace", because in the movie, the Martin Short character worked at a Safeway (he even says it to Quaid at the house) and there are scenes at Safeway (his nightmare come to life, as you can see in the scene at the doctor) with Kathleen Freeman, Henry Gibson, and Wendy Schaal, who all have done voices on cartoon shows, to my knowledege, but it's "Innerspace" with the scene. Or "Compromising Positions", there seemed to be a Safeway in that movie also, I'm not sure, it could be either or.