From the arrival of cinema and a train steaming into La Ciotat Station cinema audiences have long been in love with both the fast and the furious. The adage ‘the car’s the star’ has long been evident in Hollywood’s annals with Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Herbie, the Batmobile or the family of Minis (Minions?) in The Italian Job taking centre stage and linger in the memory.

In association with the people from Van Monster we stood atop our internet tower and gazed at the past, then plucked five of the most iconic vehicles to appear in movies.

Movie-cars-1977-Pontiac-Firebird-Trans-Am

5) 1977 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am

As featured in: Smokey And The Bandit (1977)

Registration plate: BAN ONE

Hired by Texan double-act Big Enos and his son Little Enos to transport then-prohibited Coors beer to Georgia in under 28 hours, Bo ‘Bandit’ Darville requests a fast car to act as a blocker – a distraction for the truck that will carry the illegal booze. With the Bandit leading police (or ‘Smokey’ in trucker slang) on a merry chase through several states in his classic black Firebird, the stage is set for what is essentially one big car chase. But the Bandit soon attracts the attention of the appropriately named Sheriff Buford T. Justice when he picks up Carrie, a runaway bride who was suppose to marry Justice’s simple-minded son Junior. Bit of trivia for you, Smokey And The Bandit’s theme song lends its name to the Danny McBride comedy series Eastbound & Down.

Movie-cars-1973-Ford-Falcon-XB-GT-‘Pursuit-Special’

4) 1973 Ford Falcon XB GT ‘Pursuit Special’

As featured in: Mad Max (1979) and Mad Max 2 (1981)

The black Pursuit Special, also referred to as “the last of the V8 Interceptors”, is offered to police officer ‘Mad’ Max Rockatansky as an incentive to stay on the force after seeing his friend and partner burned alive and his wife and child killed by an outlaw motorcycle gang in the first Mad Max film. In the sequel Mad Max 2, the dusty and battle-scarred Pursuit Special helps Max stay ahead of the grotesques prowling the roads of an Australia now devastated by a global nuclear holocaust, including the muscle-bound and hockey mask-wearing ‘Humungus’, a man so bad-ass he has Bennett from Commando as his bitch.

 

Movie-Cars---1963-Aston-Martin-DB53) 1963 Aston Martin DB5

As featured in: Goldfinger (1964)

Registration plate: BMT 216A (GB) / 4711-EA-62 (F) / LU 6789 (CH)

Nicknamed ‘the most famous car in the world’, the silver Aston Martin DB5 has become as much a part of the James Bond iconography as the tuxedo, the Walther PPK and the martinis. The introduction of the fully equipped DB5 not only marked the beginning of Bond’s reliance (some might say over-reliance) on gadgets and gizmos, but also established another series staple – the playfully antagonistic relationship between 007 and the permanently exasperated Q (played by Desmond Llewellyn in no fewer than 17 films).

While it’s difficult to ascertain for sure whether the Bond producers bought the two Aston Martins they used for Goldfinger, what is certain is that they never had to pay for another car again. After the release of the film in 1964, sales of the DB5 reportedly rose by fifty percent, and an official licensed tie-in toy Aston Martin from Corgi went on to be the biggest selling toy of the year.

Movie-Cars-1976-Lotus-Esprit

2) 1976 Lotus Esprit

As featured in: The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

Registration plate: PPW 306R

At the risk of raising the ire of Bond fans everywhere, when it comes to 007’s cars, for me Roger Moore’s Lotus submersible just pips the iconic Connery DB5. An investigation into missing British and Soviet submarines has led Bond and his reluctant partner Soviet agent Triple X to the island of Sardinia and the quasi-futurist underwater base of fishy shipping tycoon Karl Stromberg. Delivered to Sardinia by Q himself, the sleek white Lotus comes into its own when Bond and Triple X find themselves pursued by Stromberg’s henchman, including gigantic metal-toothed assassin Jaws.

Thanks to the car’s manoeuvrability and rear firing mud sprays, Bond makes short work of the henchmen’s vehicles, but a helicopter piloted by former pin-up Caroline Munro proves rather harder to shake off. Redefining the phrase ‘off-road’, Bond drives the Lotus off the end of a pier and into the sea, where it rather neatly transforms into a submersible, before taking out the helicopter with a surface-to-air missile.

Movie-Cars-1981-DeLorean-DMC-12

1) 1981 DeLorean DMC 12

As featured in: Back To The Future (1985)

Registration plate: OUTATIME

For any child who grew up watching films in the 1980s, there’s only one possible choice to top a list of the best movie cars. Doc Brown’s modified DeLorean time machine is about as iconic as iconic gets. But it almost wasn’t so. The original idea was for the time machine to be built inside a refrigerator that would harness the power of a nuclear explosion. Thankfully the idea was binned and the DeLorean was chosen instead – producer Steven Spielberg was worried about kids copying the film and getting stuck in fridges while director Robert Zemeckis thought it made more sense for the time machine to be mobile, plus it lent itself to a gag where the farmer mistakes the car for a UFO.

And as the Doc says: “If you’re gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?” Not one to let such a bizarre idea go to waste, Spielberg would resurrect it nearly 25 years later in his Indiana Jones sequel Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull, putting his whip-cracking hero into a chiller to escape an atomic blast and giving the world the phrase ‘nuking the fridge’.