Five of James Bond's Phenomenal Cars

Who does not know James Bond, British secret agent with the code name 007. The British secret service agent is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections.

There have been six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis, Christopher Wood, John Gardner, Raymond Benson, Sebastian Faulks and Jeffery Deaver; a new novel, written by William Boyd, is planned for release in 2013.

Additionally, Charlie Higson wrote a series on a young James Bond and Kate Westbrook wrote three novels based on the diaries of a recurring series character, Moneypenny.

"Sky Fall" is the title of the 23rd James Bond film which will debut in UK cinemas in late October and the first week of November in the United States. "Skyfall" was the first James Bond movie directed by Sam Mendes, a British film director who won an Oscar as best director in 2000 for the film "American Beauty".

"Sky Fall" movie poster. (Picture from: http://www.notorietyinc.com/)

Latest British spy agent serial is touted by many as the best in the 50 year history of the James Bond films. Robbie Coffin reviewer in the British newspaper The Telegraph assess the James Bond film by director Sam Mendes this time comparable to the movie "Batman Dark Knight" by director Christopher Nolan.

This 007 agent is described as someone who was always surrounded by beautiful women, and also features a stack of sophisticated equipment including cars. Q always gave the undercover agent a wide range of vehicles used to fight his enemies. Its very obvious of all is the James Bond cars that have been modified by the Q so that it has sophisticated weapons systems.

Many vehicles that have been involved in the film series of all time, but there are 5 cars were phenomenal and deserve to be shown and discussed here:

1. Aston Martin V12 Vanquish

Pierce Brosnan drove the Aston Martin V12 Vanquish in the movie "Die Another Day" was released in 2002. This car has a lot of weapons and gadgets and the coolest feature. This car is very decent dedicated to James Bond because it is very powerful, has a fancy design, masculine, but curvy and look like a million dollar car.

The car is equipped with all the usual Aston Martin V12 refinements, including twin .50 Caliber Autocannons, and 5 explosive rocket projectiles mounted between the 2 Autocannons, which are behind the retractable lower portion of the main front grille; dorsal target-seeking Shotguns housed on retractable pedestals within the trademark bonnet cooling vents; spikes that extend from the tires for more grip on surfaces such as ice; an Infra-Red Search and Tracking System; and a passenger ejector seat in homage to the original Aston Martin DB5, but used here in a clever bit of improvisation by 007 to right the car when it's been flipped onto its retractable roof by the proximity detonation of a Heat-Seeking Attack Missile fired from Zao's Jaguar XKR Convertible.

Pierce Bronsan with Aston Martin V12 Vanquish. (Picture from: http://jamesbond.wikia.com/)

The Vanquish's most notable feature was an "Adaptive Camouflage" Cloaking System, which allowed it to become effectively invisible (to the naked eye at least) at the push of a button: tiny cameras mounted on all sides of the car were used to capture the image facing that respective side of the vehicle (that the camera was on) and project it onto a light-emitting polymer skin on the other side, effectively making the car invisible.

2. Aston Maartin DB5

This Aston Martin DB5 was used by James Bond in film "Goldfinger". Aston Martin DB5 was first driven by Sean Connery in 1964 and became the the future car of 007 agent in the next movie.

The most famous Bond car of all, it came with all the usual Q refinements that have been copied from film to film including bulletproof panels, oil slick, smoke screen, machine guns, rotating licence plates (valid in all countries), telescoping tire slashers, Homer screen, radar receiver in reaview mirror, bumper basher, and most famously, the passenger ejector seat.

Sean Connery with 1964 Aston Martin DB5. (Picture from: http://jamesbond.wikia.com/)

The Aston Martin was actually used to promote and sell Aston Martin's cars by capitalizing on the Bond hype and mystique.

3. Aston Martin DBS

This car comes play on James Bond's movies in 2 versions, the first version driven by George Lazenby in the James Bond film titled "On Her Majesty's Secret Service". Not like the Aston Martin DB5 driven by Sean Connery, the car is only a few essential gadgets.

While the second Aston Martin DBS was on display at the "Bond In Motion". This sexy car driven by Daniel Craig in "Casino Royale" and "Quantum of Solace". Bond receives the car in Montenegro (filmed in Czech Republic) and wrecks it in a spectacular way after a short chase. In the crash, the DBS barrel-rolled seven times, in the process breaking the record for a cannon-assisted barrel roll (the stunt car had an air-powered cannon behind the driver).

The original On Her Majesty's Secret Service James Bond 007 1969 Aston Martin DBS. (Picture from: http://www.cinemaretro.com/)

2006 Aston Martin DBS on the Casino Royale. (Picture from: http://www.bondmovies.com/)

Special features of the car include a secret compartment which contains Bond's Walther P99 gun, and an emergency medical kit with components of an emergency medical link to MI6, and a small defibrillator.

4. BMW Z8

The BMW Z8 is a German car used in the series. BMW Z8 featured charm mainstay and when a vehicle driven by Pierce Brosnan in the movie "The World is Not Enough". The Z8 didn't see much action in the movie, and met it's demise at the blades of one of the King Buzzsaw Helicopers.

The Z8 was introduced at MI6 headquarters, drove through the Azerbaijani oil fields, and saw combat action on the docks outside of Valentin's caviar factory beside the Caspian Sea outside of Baku. As the Z8 is being sawed in half, Bond remarks: "Q's not going to like this!".

Pierce Bronsan with BMW Z8. (Picture from: http://www.carthrottle.com/)

The Z8 was equipped with two retractable, side-mounted Surface-to-Air Missile Launchers hidden behind the forward side fender cooling vents, remote control capability, and, amazingly, "six beverage cup holders".

5. BMW 750iL

Then BMW 750iL car was used by Pierce Brosnan in the 1997 James Bond film production entitled "Tomorrow Never Dies". The car also had 2 secure compartments hidden behind the section of the dashboard where the airbag supposedly was (and could only be opened by Bond) sliding his finger from right-to-left on a hidden fingerprint-scanner located directly under the "SRS Airbag" logo).

These two compartments (after being revealed when the "airbag-compartment" flips up) could be each opened by pressing a button on the 'door' of the compartment itself.  The left compartment slid out a tray with a integrated "cut out" intended to hold Bond's Walther PPK, as well as a silencer for the gun. The right compartment (also a "slide-out" tray) was basically an empty tray to hold anything that would fit in it.

Pierce Brosnan as Bond in Tomorrow Never Dies with the 1997 BMW 750iL. (Picture from: http://www.jamesbondlifestyle.com/)

In the movie, the right compartment was used by Bond to store the "red box" which contained the American GPS Encoder stolen by Carver's henchman (and pseudo-"I.T. guy") Henry Gupta.

The 750iL could be remotely driven and controlled via Bond's Ericsson phone, which opened up to show an LCD screen displaying the driver's view of the car (that would have front-mounted hidden microscopic cameras, to allow the remote-control "driver" to see what was in front of the car).

Weapons and defense systems included unguided explosive rockets mounted in a hidden hatch in the roof which replaced the car's standard sunroof, self-sealing and re-inflating tires, a retractable cable-cutting device mounted underneath the front hood emblem, tear gas sprayers, and caltrops that dropped from a dispenser hidden behind the extendable rear bumper to shred the tires of any following cars.. *** [DIH | FROM VARIOUS SOURCES | PIKIRAN RAKYAT 19102012]

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