In August last year, British carmaker Aston Martin surprised the world by announcing a limited production run of a very special car: the Goldfinger DB5 used in the James Bond movies starting with 1964. Now, nine months later, Aston gives us an update on how things are progressing.
The build process for the 25 units of the series is currently underway at the carmaker’s facilities, and in a short video released this week Aston shows how a team led by Chris Corbould, special effects supervisor for James Bond movies, is trying to integrate the many spy-gadgets into the car.
Each of the 25 customers that will buy a Goldfinger DB5 will get it complete with working gizmos like revolving number plates, bulletproof shields, smoke screen and more. How each of them works is detailed, in short, in the video below.
The DB5 is one of the most iconic Bond cars – Aston as a whole, in fact, the spy’s favorite – having appeared in a total of seven movies: Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), GoldenEye (1995), Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), Casino Royale (2006), Skyfall (2012) and Spectre (2015).
The 25 road-going versions of the DB5 will be an insanely expensive proposition. The carmaker will sell each for £2.75m plus taxes ($3.56 million). That’s a small price to pay by James Bond fans, according to the company’s CEO Andy Palmer.
“To own an Aston Martin has long been an aspiration for James Bond fans, but to own a Silver Birch DB5, complete with gadgets and built to the highest standards in the very same factory as the original James Bond cars? Well, that is surely the ultimate collectors’ fantasy,” he said when the announcement was made last year.
An extra three cars will be made in addition to the ones to be sold: two will be kept in the possession of Aston Martin and its partner in this project, EON Productions, and the third will be auctioned.
Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies. Full profile
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