A raised wood boardwalk lined with casino hotel towers, arcades and the ocean beyond.
What Boardwalk looks like
The Boardwalk runs about five and a half miles along the ocean, a wood deck laid in a herringbone pattern over a concrete and steel substructure. It is sixty feet wide at its widest point and closed to cars, so bicycles, rolling chairs and walkers share the same planks. Benches and iron lamp posts line both sides, with kiosks selling salt water taffy set between them.
Casino hotel towers rise directly off the boards for most of the route. 's tower stands at the north end, and sits a few blocks south of it. keeps its original vertical sign lit above its own entrance, a gold sphere marking the Hard Rock just past it. , farther south, has a Roman themed facade of columns and arches over its own entrance.
extends out over the water near the Hard Rock end, its tall observation wheel visible from blocks away along the boards. , a limestone hall with a barrel vaulted roof, sits farther south still. Its forward corner is angled to square with the promenade rather than the street grid behind it. A shuttered storefront near still has a globe lodged in its marquee, left from an attraction that no longer operates.
Below the boards, a sand beach runs the same length as the promenade, with lifeguard stands and striped umbrellas in season. Side streets run inland between the towers, holding food stands and arcades under awnings and neon signage. The current planks date from a 1916 rebuild, laid in the same herringbone pattern as the original 1870 planks.
Shot in Boardwalk
Resorts, at 1133 Boardwalk, is the only casino on this stretch to turn up as itself in more than one production. Atlantic City filmed on the working casino floor in 1979, and The Color of Money spent a day at the same building seven years later.
Atlantic City, 1980
The Resorts casino floor
Louis Malle's production filmed on the real casino floor at Resorts, one of only two casinos running in Atlantic City at the time. The hotel gave the production fifteen hours of permission to shoot there. Street View
The Color of Money, 1986
The Color of Money spent one day filming at the Resorts International Hotel in Atlantic City. Its nine ball tournament scenes were staged at Chicago's Navy Pier, so this building is the only real Atlantic City location in the film. Street View
What Boardwalk can double for
Las Vegas Strip in Las Vegas, Nevada
The run of casino hotel towers with their own porte cocheres and marquee signs gives the same casino strip look, at a fraction of the Strip's own permit cost. Resorts and the Hard Rock's dense run of signage is the closest stretch to that look. There is no monorail or desert backdrop here. A low wide shot will catch the wood planks underfoot, so keep the frame tight on the towers and entrances. Try searching casino strip look now.
A wood boardwalk over a beach, with food stands and an amusement pier, matches Coney Island's own look when the frame stays off the modern casino towers. Steel Pier's own wheel stands in for Coney Island's amusement rides. Coney Island's Cyclone and Wonder Wheel have no equivalent here, so a production needs its own ride dressing in any wide shot that needs one. Try searching wood boardwalk amusement pier now.
Blackpool in Lancashire, England
Another seaside resort promenade with arcades and a tall landmark wheel, Blackpool shares the general shape of a boardwalk town built around its own big draw. The comparison works loosest at a distance, where the silhouette of towers and a wheel could belong to either town. Blackpool's promenade is paved rather than planked, and its tower is cast iron rather than a casino. Close shots of the ground or the skyline give it away. Try searching seaside promenade arcades now.
