B O N D

The Petersen Automotive Museum is one of my favorite haunts, celebrating one of my favorite subjects: Cars.

You’ve seen me post about them here before, and it’s happening again.

* Before we continue, I’m obliged to tell you that clicking on the links and watching these awesome movies may help me earn some coffee money, so thank you for doing that!

The last time I got some good visits in at the Petersen was, of course, pre-pandemic when their featured exhibit was Hollywood Dream Machines. That exhibit was likely the greatest I had ever seen at the museum as it combined cars with one of my other favorite subjects: Screen-used movie artifacts.

So after everyone in Los Angeles behaved well enough for about eighteen months, indoor venues were able to re-open to the public, and the Petersen, smartly recognizing the success of Dream Machines, wanted to get museum goers back into the building, and so they started off with sort of a bang: Bond In Motion.

Billed as “the largest official Bond vehicle exhibit the United States,” one can imagine the excitement you might feel getting to see a stable of vehicles used in one of the greatest film franchises (and arguably one of the first) of all time.

There’s just one problem: It was rather disappointing. Let’s talk about what was there.

The first car you see is a 1964 Aston Martin DB5 in Silver Birch

No, not the iconic car from Goldfinger, but rather the non-canonically inexplicable one that seems to pop up in the films from time to time beginning with Goldeneye back in 1995, and repeatedly being destroyed. The description plaque claimed the car had been used in five films, but was still somehow vague at best as to whether or not this car was used….or just that a DB5 was used. As a story nitpicker personally, I also must point out that as a plot point, it has been complete nonsense as to how the DB5 has been utilized periodically over the years. I won’t go into that here though.

All that being said, it was gorgeous (although I’m more of a DB6 guy personally), and utterly spotless, which also sort of lent credence to this car not being used all that much in production.

Moving on you then come across a tow sled scuba thing from Thunderball, as well as a rather large empty spot where there is an explainer of the exhibit along with a supercut of scenes involving James Bond and his vehicles through the decades.

I have a theory about this empty space.

I think the Petersen was trying to get the Diamonds Are Forever Moon Buggy, and couldn’t, and this is where it would have been parked.

Anyway, after the scuba tow sled, you then get to see a helicopter miniature from You Only Live Twice, a model jet from Goldfinger and the Red 1969 Mercury Cougar from On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. I have to admit, the Merc is cool man, real cool.

From there, the next items on display include Blofeld’s “Bath-O-Sub,” a 3-wheeler ATV (both pictured above), and the the Mustang Mach 1 from Diamonds Are Forever that drove on two wheels, then somehow magically on its other two wheels (see the movie, you’ll see what I mean).

From this point on, we are leaving the Connery films (which we didn’t start with in the exhibit from some reason) and we are moving on to Moore movie vehicles.

Next to the Mustang, is the jump boat from Live and Let Die. Okay, it’s a boat, that’s nice, and behind us is the AMC Hornet that did the Spiral Barrel Roll jump over the bridge in The Man with the Golden Gun. Finally, we have an important car from the films! The spiral barrel roll jump was a packaged stunt, brought from Chip Milligan’s & Raymond McHenry’s work on the Astro Spiral Jump and an early demonstration of how a computer simulation of the jump could predict the real-world outcome (ie success!). This was an interesting vehicle to see there, but somehow, not interesting enough for me to take a photo.

Not Wet Nellie

Alright, here we have some issues. First of all, this isn’t Wet Nellie. Wet Nellie, the fully functional submersible, is owned by Elon Musk. Second, the plaque for this piece claims this submersible is the one used for the scene of it launching the underwater missile from its rear hatch. The only problem is, you can’t screen match that as the Lotus in the exhibit had a singular hole for the missile to come out of, and in the film, there are four holes. So this is either not that vehicle, it had a rear hatch fabricated to replace a missing one, or it’s a replica altogether. This was another example of a vehicle that looked to be in too-good condition to have actually been used in production, and I suspect it was actually just used for promotions around the film. That’s just my speculative opinion.

Next to the Lotus was a Wetbike, which was…like…okay, there’s that. The plaque was also vague as to whether this was used in the film or just one that belonged to the owner of the Wetbike company which was placed in the exhibit in the exhibit.

The rear hatch with one missile as seen in at The Petersen

The rear hatch with one missile whole and three faux holes in The Spy Who Loved Me

A Boat

To the left of Not-Wet Nellie, was the rather nifty and gadget-filled boat Roger Moore captained in Moonraker. It was super-sparkly and in remarkable condition, but then again, it was a really nice boat by even modern standards so it likely received a lot of TLC as it moved through its chain of title, eventually winding up with the Ian Fleming Foundation.

We keep walking and we’re now looking at a cluster of vehicles from For Your Eyes Only. These included a rather large fiberglass submarine prop, half of a Citroen CV3 used for filming interior, and a beach buggy. We’re now getting into prop vehicle refuse territory. The stuff that doesn’t really matter much. You know, like a tuk-tuk from Octopussy. Even if stuff like this is VIN matched, it lacks the fizz of vehicles borne out of Q Branch.

As you can tell, I’m writing about pieces I didn’t bother to photograph, like another scuba tow sled from Never Say Never Again. They simply weren’t that interesting to me.

And now, something super cool.

The 007 Aston Martin MV8 Saloon from The Living Daylights. This is one of…in my humble opinion…the coolest cars ever made, and way cooler as a Bond Car, than was the DB5 in its contemporary films (ie Goldfinger). This is what I’m here to see, except that there’s something both very interesting, and kind of disappointing about it.

It’s not an actual V8. It’s a fiberglass effects shell with V8 trim pieces. Even the wheels and tires aren’t real. Instead of being the car driven by Timothy Dalton, it is the car filmed for the transformation scenes, as well as a jump I think. So while it is certainly an interesting piece from the standpoint of being an effects prop, it’s got no soul, one of the three pillars at Aston Martin, mind you.

Overhead, there’s a Cessna airplane used in License to Kill. That’s about it. A plane.

Next is a Cagiva motorcycle from GoldenEye and a BMW motorcycle from Tomorrow Never Dies, also remarkably underwhelming.

We’re now deep in Brosnan Bond territory and on to yet another boat. This time it is the Jet Boat from The World is Not Enough. It would seem that there were a lot of these boats made as images are not hard to find on the internet. The Ian Fleming Foundation (more on them later) claims that 15 were built and 6 remain. Or is it 7? Their math is a little fuzzy.

Behind the boat are two BMWs that might as well be any BMWs and likely didn’t spend a second on film sets. The first a 750iL, ostensibly used in Tomorrow Never Dies but probably not really, as the sunroof missile launcher bears little resemblance to what we see in the film, and the interior is just a basic BMW. We also know that the actual cars exist and SuperCar Blondie got a chance to visit one so it’s clear that this was probably just a sedan that sat outside premiers and publicity events.

Then there is the Z8, supposedly from The World is Not Enough, and again, way too clean to have been ever even touched by actual fingers, let alone survive a movie production. Once again, I’m skeptical of its cred.

We now thankfully leave the BMW era at Bond behind and move to vehicles from Die Another Day. The first is a snowmobile that apparently doesn’t hold a lot of intrinsic value as people are allowed to sit on it to have their pictures taken. From there, we see the Aston Martin V12 Vanquish supposedly used in the chase scene. I have a lot of issues with this vehicle. I’m not sure it was used in production, rather I believe it was a publicity vehicle modified to look like it was. Its condition, again, is too good for any of the vehicles that survived the filming on the ice lake. Couple with that the fact that the plaque the Petersen had displayed listed its engine as a V12 and we need to talk.

It is relatively well known by Bond/Aston Martin enthusiasts that the Vanquishes used in the lake chase scenes were in fact Vanquish shells only, and were powered by Ford Explorer V8 engines and 4-wheel drive systems. So if this was a car used for filming, why not state that fact about it? That is interesting information for museum visitors to learn! It is quite possible it was a publicity vehicle built to look like it was used on the film, and given that it has toured all over the world and been put on numerous displays over the years, it would be okay to admit to that.

In fact the Petersen has just such a vehicle: the ’89 Batmobile, which they acknowledge was one of several built after Tim Burton’s Batman to help promote its release. Yes this Vanquish has a heavily modified interior, but again, if you look through the tinted windows inside, it is super clean in there and other photos around the web will show you the same thing with the windows down and the doors open. Not so much as a stain on the carpet, nor loose panels, or any kind of scratches or scuffs. I speculate that at best, the hood, gun things, and grille missiles were pulled from a production-used vehicle and added to this publicity vehicle. This photo was from my article on Hollywood Dream Machines.

Behind the Vanquish however, is a car that does appear to be the real deal: The XKR from the same film. Here you can see the interior and it is well worn, with stickers denoting functions and cables running everywhere and exposed frame sections and the plaque which accurately describes the power train (also the ford V8 with 4 wheel drive). Was that so hard? It would seem that the Petersen is honest about the cars it owns, but may be contractually obliged by the owners of loaned vehicles to put the descriptions down that they want there, even if they are not true, and given that the Petersen is a non-profit learning institution (a museum), this is troubling.

CRAIG

Next up, we loop around for contemporary Bond Cars – three Aston Martins from the Daniel Craig Era, although it’s a bit of a reverse order based on how loop back goes, with the DB10 from Spectre being the first car we see, which was likely also not used in filming as there is a plethora of evidence that the filming vehicles were all kinds of chopped up and modified and this was one of two complete vehicles intended for promoting the film (the other having been sold at auction). I saw the other car in England back in 2016. Can you spot the difference between the two? It’s subtle, but it’s there!

Car 1/2 at the Petersen in 2021

Car 2/2 at an AMOC event in England in 2016

In front of the DB10 is the scraped up doorless DBS from the epic opening chase scene of Quantum of Solace. I’m inclined to believe this was screen-used given its condition, although of course, all the damage is simulated. A close look at the bullet holes reveals they were not even squibbed, but just cut out of the leather, albeit incredibly convincingly though!

And finally, we end on the rolled DBS from Casino Royale. This car has definitely seen better days, but hey it set some records and died for Queen and Country, so godspeed to you good car. I’m pretty sure they used this in the film. You don’t go rolling another Aston Martin to promote a film. Seems like unwise spending.

The ‘Quantum of Solace’ DBS

The ‘Casino Royale’ DBS

Epilogue

As I was walking through the exhibit, I realized something about these vehicles, literally all of them, with the exception of one, came from only two sources, the first was the Ian Fleming Foundation, and the second was Eon Productions. That struck me as really not curation, but rather just a showcase, and I wasn’t really that impressed once this became clear. Another odd thing is that The Ian Fleming Foundation isn’t some sort of UK-based heritage trust, but rather a “non-profit” group of collectors with a hangar based in Santa Barbara, California that buys up Bond vehicles, no matter how obscure or irrelevant for the purpose of renting them out to special events (they would probably do your birthday, wedding, or bar mitzvah too). The whole thing seemed a little sketchy. On top of that, to my earlier point, Eon Productions only sent vehicles that likely were not used, or barely used in the films, knowing full well the intrinsic value of screen-used Bond items..

I want to give the Petersen the benefit of the doubt. I want to believe they tried harder than this. They have had featured exhibits that, to my eye, have gone much further in bringing together disparate collections for display, most notably Dream Machines, which pulled from all kinds of sources and had (apart from the red Deckard Coupe from Blade Runner), accurate descriptions on their plaques. And as I mentioned earlier, the Deckard Coupe plaque may have been a requirement of the loan from the Miami police museum (assuming it was a loan and not now part of the Petersen collection….which I hope it is). But there was a lot more from Bond In Motion (the touring exhibit) that could have been included here. Maybe it wound up as part of the Vault tour, or maybe the museum simply couldn’t afford to ship more from the UK. If it was the latter, then the blame falls squarely on the sponsors, DHL and Hagerty for not giving the museum more flexibility in this regard, instead having to fall back on the local collection of Bond vehicles of far lesser significance to fill out the space. I don’t know.

But what I can say is that this was a nice exhibit, if far from the best selection of film vehicles (whether from a single franchise or multiple movies) and it was really great to return to the Petersen after 18 months of lockdown.

I see that they now have a new exhibit upstairs on hypercars, so I will definitely be returning for that!

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