Over the years, I've amassed an embarrassingly large collection of diecast cars, including most of the available Corgi Bond vehicles. Many were given me by my partner Paul who indulges my whims with admirable stoicism. A few I've picked up on impulse from the used bookstore, our local grocery store, and the occasional online shopping rabbit-hole. Paul and I visited the "Bond in Motion" exhibit at the London Film Museum in Covent Garden a few years ago at Christmastime and I have since been inspired to create my own virtual Bond vehicle exhibit using my diecast collection and my "enough to be dangerous" web development knowledge. Another inspiration was a "Concours d'Elegance" we toured while attending a polo match in Potomac Maryland back in the late 1970s. I think I might have photos of that event somewhere - I remember being enthralled by a white Lotus Elite. My Dad and I shared a love of car exhibitions and I remember going to several with him over the years, including a Bond vehicle show that was part of the Washington, D.C. Auto show back in the 80s. So, this Concours is for you, Dad!
I know that my descriptions of how I handle my models will cause dock asthma and pearl-clutching among the "mint in box" set. My MO is to rip open and thus destroy the box, handle the model until something breaks off, launch the weapons until they're lost forever behind the furniture, and then retire the model to a shelf where it gathers a furry coat of dust. Mea culpa.
Oh, and in discussing how the cars are used in the various films, I will be referencing plot elements, so... spoiler alert!
In the film:
Apart from the Sunbeam Alpine driven by Bond in Dr. No, and the Bentley seen briefly at the beginning of "From Russia with Love", this is Bond's first vehicle, and certainly his most iconic. Bond (and we, the audience) are introduced to and given a tour of the car by Q, in his laboratory at MI6. The car is tricked out with an amazing array of gadgets including revolving number plates, machine guns, a bulletproof shield, a map-based navigation screen that anticipates GPS, tire rippers, oil slick sprayer, and a passenger ejector seat which elicits one of the best exchanges of the series between Bond and Q: Bond: "Ejector seat? You must be joking!" Q: "I never joke about my work, 007." The car is used to great extent in the film, including a chase along switchback mountain roads in the magnificent setting of the Swiss Alps, and a high-speed pursuit in and around Goldfinger's Swiss factory. The former ends with Bond deploying the tire rippers and puncturing two of the tires of Tilly's Mustang (she seems not to notice the massive gash it also makes in the coachwork). The latter was filmed along forest roads in Black Park and among the buildings of adjacent Pinewood studios.
The DB5 is a gorgeous car. It came to be identified so strongly with the character that it reappeared in the next film "Thunderball" and made return "retro" appearances in the Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig era films - in the latter installments, its presence is variously explained as having been won by Bond in a poker game in "Casino Royale" and, somehow, being Bond's personal property (and yet somehow also the government's) in "Skyfall" and "Spectre". As with so many absurd aspects of the Bond films, its appearance in those two films is so confidently presented that one doesn't question it while watching the movies for the first time. On the way home, however...
The model:
At the last minute, I changed my mind as to which of my models to include. Rather than one of the two gadget-laden Corgis, I instead chose a model labeled "Kinsmart" that I picked up at a craft store. I feel a bit of a traitor to Corgi, but this one had crisper details than their versions.
In the film:
The car is first seen at Stoke Poges golf club when Bond arrives for his game with Goldfinger. It's an awesome vehicle - we saw it at the London Film Museum in the "Bond in Motion" exhibit during Christmas in 2018. It occupied a place of honor at the bottom of the stairs leading into the exhibit. Uniquely among the Bond movie vehicles, the car is the film's MacGuffin - the object or device that drives the plot - Goldfinger replaces the car's coachwork temporarily with gold for the trip to his factory in Switzerland. It's Bond's investigation of Goldfinger's smuggling activities that leads him to information about the villain's ultimate objective.
The vehicle is elegance itself with its black and yellow color scheme, chrome grille and headlamps, and sweeping fenders. It forms part of an unforgettable tableau with the facade of Stoke Park, the beheaded statue, and the absurd, threatening figure of Oddjob, Goldfinger's chauffeur.
The model:
Another wonderful Corgi miniature. The miniscule "Spirit of Ecstasy" hood ornament on mine got snapped off somewhere, dammit. The model came with a miniature of Oddjob in the act of tossing his razor-brimmed bowler. Poor Tilly.
In the film:
Fiona Volpe is my favorite character from the movie. She's gorgeous, funny, and deadly. Everything she does is done to the extreme including her driving and when she gives Bond a lift from where he comes ashore after his reconnoitre of the Disco Volante, she tears along the coast road at an improbable 110 MPH (or thereabouts). Her car is another Ford Mustang, light blue with a grey convertible top (in the "up" position in the film). It's a strange scene which feels random and disconnected from the action of the rest of the film, but it's very enjoyable in its way. The banter between Volpe and Bond is fun: "some men don't like to be driven", "some men don't like being taken for a ride". Like many scenes in "Thunderball" it's fun for the spectacle of stylishly dressed people in the beautiful Bahamian setting. The car is exquisite - Ford vehicles would feature prominently in many of the subsequent Bond films.
The model:
An impulse buy - this larger scale (1:18?) Revell model isn't a movie tie-in - I bought it because it closely resembled the one in the film.
In the film:
It wasn't until I'd seen this film a couple of times before I learned that the aircraft used by Bond to explore the Japanese volcanoes wasn't a helicopter but a gyroplane or autogyro. The main rotor of an autogyro is unpowered and is turned by the forward motion of the aircraft which is powered by a pusher prop. The spinning rotor generates lift and the aircraft takes off and lands from a runway like a fixed-wing aircraft. World War II veteran pilot Ken Wallis became an expert in this type of vehicle later in his career and not only developed but flew his Wallis WA-116 Autogyro for the scenes in the film, effectively serving as a stunt double for Sean Connery. The autogyro, nicknamed "Little Nellie", with its attractive yellow and black paint scheme, buzzes like a wasp among the Spectre helicopters sent to shoot it down and deploys a variety of weapons to vanquish its pursuers. Little Nellie is brought by Q and his team to Japan in several large suitcases and is assembled in a stop-motion montage. The gag of a vehicle being delivered by such means would be repeated in "The Spy Who Loved Me" in which Bond's wetbike (a sort of jet ski) is delivered to him in an immense duffelbag.
The model:
This is an exquisitely detailed Corgi edition with folding rotor blades. It's extremely fragile and I'm terrified to touch it. Like many of the vehicles represented in this collection, we saw the real thing at that exhibit at the London Film Museum in 2018.
In the film:
The action of this film (except for a few early scenes in Hong Kong) takes place entirely in Japan. The 2000GT was the first Japanese car to really hit it big on the international scene. Only a few hundred were made, and the convertible version was custom-built for the film (because, from what I understand, Connery simply didn't fit into the hardtop) and was never a production offering. In the film, the car is driven by Aki, a member of the Japanese Secret Service who collaborates with Bond on his mission. Aki is an enigmatic figure early in the story and her car suits her perfectly - exotic, graceful, ghostly white. It is Aki's expert driving that saves Bond on more than one occasion - the scenes in which she speeds through the neon-streaked streets of Tokyo or along scenic mountain switchbacks are exhilirating. It's an unusual-looking car, but very beautiful.
The model:
This is a Hot Wheels model that I bought on impulse at our local grocery store. It's not a Bond tie-in and is the production hardtop and not the convertible created for the film.
In the film:
Bond and Tracy's cars are used interestingly in the film - they serve as stand-ins or markers for their owners, in a way. Bond and Tracy "meet" while driving - she overtakes him on a seaside road on the way to her would-be suicide. Later, he sees her Cougar parked at the hotel and knows that she's there. Still later, she sees his Aston parked at her father's estate and is so warned of his presence. She saves him by driving him in her car away from his Spectre pursuers, and then leaves her signature vehicle behind when she accepts his proposal. The bullet fired by Irma Bunt in the film's final scene first travels through the windshield of Bond's Aston Martin before...
I've spotted this car twice in the wild: once in a London street back in 2001, once at (oddly) MOSI - The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. Viewing the film, I was struck by how modern the design was, particularly the narrow band of the rear end. It's a very different car from the previous DB5/DB6 style generation. It serves (literally) as the vehicle of George Lazenby's introduction as Bond. Lazenby is first seen in a series of closeups as he lights a cigarette while driving along the coast in Portugal. New model Bond/new model Aston.
The model:
This is a recent rerelease of the Corgi model. It's lovely - nice and heavy, beautifully detailed, and it arrived in an elegant black presentation box. The paint scheme is a lot greener than I remember the car looking in the film. During a recent viewing, I had a careful look at the car in the film and, while green, it's definitely not as green as the model.
In the film:
Tracy's red Cougar is a powerful, sassy ride. She hurls it around the curves of the Swiss Alpine roads as she drives Bond away from Bunt and her henchmen in their black Mercedes saloon and flings it around the ice track in the winter carnival auto rally they intrude upon. Diana Rigg did much of the driving during the rally scene, I understand. Her intensity and enthusiasm in that scene are infectious.
The model:
Mine is a Johnny Lightning which, in spite of its tiny size, is exquisitely detailed.
In the film:
Tiffany Case has always been a favorite character of mine from the series, but it's a little disappointing how she's let down by the script of the film. Early on, she's much like the character in the source novel - wry, sarcastic, a bit world-weary - but later in the film she devolves into clownish ineptitude. She has one effective bit of business in her Mustang - she cuts off Professor Doctor Metz in his van long enough for Bond to climb into the back, and she follows to the Whyte laboratory and is ready to pick up Bond when he makes his escape. But it's Bond who drives when they're trying to elude the police in Las Vegas, robbing Tiffany's character from the opportunity to show a bit of Aki/Tracy-style effectiveness. The Mach 1 is a wonderfully aggressive and muscular-looking automobile. The sweep of the front end makes it look as though it's leaping forward even when standing still. There are wonderful shots of Bond and Tiffany through the windshield as the reflected lights of Las Vegas slide along the coachwork. I wish the filmmakers had used the original footage of the car emerging from the alley, even though "ruined" by the visible crowds of onlookers. The ludicrous insert shots they used to cover up the continuity error in the reshoot are worse than the original problem.
The model:
Paul bought me a beautiful Motor Max 1:18 scale version of this car. As of this writing, I haven't yet photographed it for this page, but I want to see if I can imitate the reflected lights of Vegas.
In the film:
All aspects of the scene in which this car appears are contrivances to justify a truly amazing car stunt: the spiral jump. Scaramanga and Nick-Nack are escaping in their AMC Matador(!) and Bond nips into a nearby AMC dealership (!) and gets into a car occupied by a customer waiting for a test drive - Sheriff J.W. Pepper(!) from the previous film who, with his wife, is vacationing in Thailand(!). Assuming one can suspend one's disbelief on ALL those fronts, one can enjoy the ensuing car chase and spiral jump. The jump was developed in a computer simulation and had never been performed in a film. The car had to be altered to evenly distribute the weight (the configuration of the Hornet was a deciding factor) and the stunt driver, Loren Willert, had to operate the vehicle lying down on the floor with dummies representing Bond and Pepper above him. The stunt was accomplished in one flawless take and is a truly amazing spectacle - the car rolling through 360 degrees in midair. Years after the film's release, composer John Barry voiced regret that he had compromised the stunt with a slide whistle sound effect.
The model:
This is another of the Corgi-issued Bond vehicles. It might be the least exotic of Bond's rides, but it's a nice little model - I love the color and the white stripes down the sides. The Bond in Motion exhibit didn't provide any information about how the vehicles on display were actually used in the film. The one we saw in 2018 was obviously not the one reconfigured and used in the jump. Presumably it was (one of the ones) used in the chase scene? Who can say?
In the film:
Except for the brief scene in which the car arrives in Sardinia on a ferry (presumably from mainland Italy) and is delivered to Bond by Q, this car appears in only one scene - an epic chase along mountain roads in which it eludes a motorcyclist with an exploding sidecar, machine gun-toting henchmen in a sedan, a helicopter piloted by Stromberg's henchwoman Naomi, and... but more on that in the next entry.
This might JUST be my favorite car of all time. The elegant design is by Giorgetto Giugiaro who based it partly on his Maserati Boomerang concept car and and partly on Oliver Winterbottom's designs for Lotus' existing line which included the Elite and Eclat. Up through the 60s, Lotus had been producing cars with goggly headlights and long running boards like the Lotus Seven, but in the 70s they fully embraced the "flying doorstop" aesthetic. The Lotus was only waist-high to Roger Moore and really is a tiny car. The one in the film (portrayed by a large number of modified vehicles and models) is white with a greyish-green interior with red tartan accents(!). It sounds awful, but it looks really cool. In the course of the road chase, Bond deploys a rearward spray of some sort of black paint onto the windshield of the pursuing sedan, causing the driver to lose control and drive off a cliff. Anyone thinking that the gadgets ended there had only to wait about two more minutes.
The model:
This is a 1:18 scale Auto Art reproduction and is very beautifully detailed. The doors, bonnet, and boot all open to reveal wonderful detail - engine, spare tire, upholstery design, dashboard instruments.
In the film:
We return to the roads of northern Sardinia where Bond and Anya are being pursued by Naomi in her Bell 206 helicopter. There are some amazing shots in this sequence, including one where Bond spins the Lotus around in a turnout and Naomi attempts to match his movements, causing the helicopter to do an incredible bouncy turn maneuver. The chase proceeds down to the coast where Bond drives out onto a long concrete pier, scattering boxes and crates and then off the end into the ocean. What follows is an amazing sequence of shots which use models and specially prepared full-size sections of the car to depict the vehicle's transformation into a submarine. The wheels fold in, the wheel wells are covered and sealed, fins extend, a periscope appears from the roof - when I saw this for the first time in the theater when I was thirteen, I was absolutely convinced that a fully transforming submarine car existed (it doesn't). The full-sized submarine used in most of the rest of the sequence was created by Perry submarines from a Lotus body shell and is a wet sub - the occupants wore full scuba apparatus. To hide the fact that the vehicle was full of water and scuba equipment, the windows are covered by strange, black louvers which emerged from who knows where. Bond dispatches the hovering Naomi with a missile somehow fired through the window of the rear hatch and the pair proceed to explore Stromberg's Atlantis Laboratory from below the surface. In an ensuing fight with frogmen and another wet sub, the Lotus deploys more missiles, a mine, and the paint gun which now serves a sort of squid ink role. After eluding Stromberg's underwater army, the Lotus drives out of the water and across a beach to the comical bemusement of holidaygoers.
The model:
The submarine version of the Auto Art model faithfully reproduces all of the attributes of the submarine seen in the film. Strangely, the front running lights are a different color.
In the film:
The second of two Lotus Esprit Turbos driven by Bond in this film. The first, a white one, is driven by Bond to near a villa in Spain where Bond sees Gonzales, the hit man, receive a payoff only to be killed by Melina. Escaping from the villa with Melina, Bond finds his car being broken into by Gonzales' henchmen. The car's security system causes it to be blown sky-high when a window is broken with the butt of a pistol. Bond and Melina are forced to complete their escape in Melina's decidedly unglamorous Citroen 2CV. This second Lotus is driven by Bond around the northern Italian ski resort of Cortina d'Ampezzo. While the cars look fantastic, they are used by Bond strictly for conveyance and don't feature in any chases or other action, which is a little disappointing.
The model:
This is a Corgi model and I love that it includes the ski rack and skis over the rear window. The front is a little wonky - the front bumper seems a bit high and the stickers representing the lights don't quite convince.
In the film:
One of my favorite cars in one of my favorite Bond movies. We first see it as Bond arrives at the Blayden Safe House with a Harrod's Hamper to attend the debriefing of recently-defected Russian General Khoskhov. It's the Volante convertible that Bond drives through the gates of that country estate. Later, in Qs lab, we see it being "winterised" into the hardtop Vantage model used by Bond to collect Kara in Bratislava and during the ensuing car chase through wintry Czechoslovakia. Gadgets abound with a police band radio scanner, a laser updating of the tire-rippers from "Goldfinger", rocket-assist, outrigger snow skis, and a self-destruct option used by Bond when the chase ends with the Aston hopelessly embedded in a snowdrift. Sorry, the chase hadn't quite ended - it truly ends when Bond and Kara sled into Austria, sitting in the halves of Kara's open cello case. "We have nothing to declare!" "Except my cello!"
It was good to see Bond driving an Aston Martin again. Except for his two-and-a-half Lotuses, Moore's Bond was a vehicular opportunist, driving mainly commandeered vehicles (double-decker bus, showroom car, stolen Alfa, fire truck) - the equipping of Bond with a gadget-laden vehicle is a favorite aspect of the series for me and it good to have it back for this film. The Vantage is a beautiful car in a chunky, muscular sort of way. It has all the Aston styling cues: that raised bit in the top-middle of the grille, that weird opening behind the top of the front wheel well with the chrome doodad going through it, the lovely swoop of the roof line - but all executed with a broad-shouldered, snarling feel.
The model:
As of this writing, I still haven't worked out how to deploy the outrigger snow skis. No, scratch that! I JUST found (what else?) a YouTube video that explains how to do it - press the exhaust openings. This Corgi is a beautiful model. Satisfyingly heavy. Lots of lovely detail in the grille, lights, etc.
In the film:
I have to agree with amazing World-of-Bond Youtuber Calvin Dyson that this BMW, while gorgeous, has to be one of Bond's most disappointing screen vehicles. Apart from a glimpse of it in Q's lab where it expels a promising-looking drag chute, it appears in only one scene in which Bond and Natalya drive it along a road in some unnamed Caribbean location. Apparently, the plan was to utilize it more extensively in scenes that were either cut or never filmed. I like Brosnan's detour into Munich with his screen vehicles and I'm glad they played such a prominent role in his two middle films.
The model:
Another lovely Corgi, this one with little plastic representations of Brosnan and Scorupco. When I picked it up just now, the stinger missiles fell out of the passenger compartment where I'd stowed them.
In the film:
Following a pattern exhibited in many of the films, this car appears in basically two scenes: Q's delivery and gadget-lecture, and a chase scene set piece. Both scenes are awesome in this film. The first, set in a hangar at Hamburg airport, sees Q trying to demonstrate the car's remote-control feature only to have Bond take over and send the vehicle careening around the hangar to screech to a halt inches in front of the pair. It's a great scene for veteran Q, Desmond Llewelyn who, in this scene, has perfected his grumpy disapproval of Bond's disregard for his equipment. The chase scene in the hotel parking garage is sublime. Bond drives the vehicle using his cell phone while lying in the back seat, deploying missiles, tire-puncturing caltrops (had to look up that one), and a cable-cutter that rises from the hood from underneath the BMW logo. Fantastic stuff. I love the female voice feature of the car which is reduced to feebly protesting the excesses of the chase - "warning, pedestrians in roadway".
The model:
Generally speaking, I'd prefer to have these models without the gadget features. They're fun for pretty much only ten minutes after the unboxing after which the missiles get lost or the springs get worn and the secret compartments fail to fully close. The cable cutter and missile compartment on this car no longer close all the way, giving the model an uncomfortable, dyspeptic air.
In the film:
I don't think we get a Q introduction for this one - if memory serves, Bond is suddenly just driving it in Azerbaidjan. I like that we get to see him ligging around in the car apart from the big "use of the car" scene at Zukowsky's caviar factory battle. I'm particularly fond of the brief sequence in which Bond drives through a stand of pine trees on the way to meet up with Elektra's party - I believe it was filmed in Black Park, which we visited in 2018. If the scene WASN'T filmed along that wonderful, straight road among the rows of pine trees, I don't want to know. As in the previous film this car has a remote-driving feature (implemented by using the key fob?) and missiles, which deploy from a delightfully fussy launcher that emerges from the side of the car just in front of the door. As in "For Your Eyes Only" part of this car's raison d'etre is to provide a comical destruction scenario, in this case the car is sawn in half by a bizarre apparatus carried beneath a helicopter. At the end of the film, bafflingly, the MI6 team locates Bond by finding the car's heat signature using a satellite. If they didn't know where he or the car were, how did he get hold of a replacement car? Is it like the SPVs in Captain Scarlet where they're just salted around waiting for an agent to pick them up?
The model:
Another satisfying heavy little model from Corgi. It has the missile launchers which at least close flush with the body. I saw one of these cars in "real life" somewhere here in Brookfield. It's a very beautiful vehicle.
In the film:
As preposterous (and really kind of bad) as this film is, the scenes involving the Aston Martin are super cool. John Cleese is a hoot in the "equipping" scene which takes place in his lab which, for some reason, is in a disused Tube station. The idea of an invisible car is intriguing and while it's depicted inventively in the film, disbelief remained unsuspended for me. The Vanquish is a gorgeous car - the Aston styling cues here represented in a wonderfully fluid style. We saw one of these parked on a Central London street back in 2005. Bond's use of the ejector seat mechanism to flip his car back onto its wheels during the chase on the frozen lake is VERY satisfying. The patchy, digital-ly way in which the invisibility switches on and off (and malfunctions) is visually very attractive.
The model:
This was a "find". I was at Half-Price Books and saw this on their movie tie-in merch table. When Paul and I went on our trip to the UK at Christmas 2018, Paul took his Funko-Pop Prince Harry for photo ops and I took this Aston Martin model. I took photos with it at a number of locations: The Regent's Canal, Thames bank, The Long Walk at Windsor, Oakley Court - it serves as a wonderful souvenir of that wonderful trip. I can hold it and look at the photos and know that it and we were there in a very compelling way (I freely acknowledge the weirdness of this). Strangely, the model has no side mirrors.
In the film:
This vehicle is in a sort of limbo of credibility between the DB10 from "Spectre" (barely credible) and the Moon Buggy from "Diamonds Are Forever" (not credible, but intentionally and humorously so). For me, this is a symptom of problems in tone in this film. Bond being tortured for 14 months in prison coexists very uncomfortably with a fourth-wall-breaking gadget retrospective and Bond parakitesurfing (or whatever he's doing) through dodgy CGI. Zao's car is as improbable as he is - weirdly colored, blingy, impractical. It and he come to a fittingly improbable end: crashing through the floor of a melting ice palace and being crushed/julienned by a falling ice crystal chandelier.
The model:
Another Corgi. I think I lost the red missiles. The mechanism for the aft rocket launcher is wonky. It has a weird figurine of Zao in the driver's seat which looks more like one of "The Gentlemen" from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer". It's a nice model, though. I love the Jaguar XKR and this convertible version isn't unattractive. This is one of the many vehicles we saw at "Bond in Motion".
In the film:
This is SUCH a beautiful car, I wish it had been in more scenes of the film. It's appearance is so brief and it's demise SO spectacular, it rivals the white Lotus from "For Your Eyes Only" in that regard. For my money (not that I'd ever have enough to buy one) this is the most beautiful of the recent Astons. The styling cues are all beautifully rendered (some recent models do strangely fussy things with the headlights, grille, and side thingies), and the overall proportions of the vehicle are very pleasing. It's heartbreaking to see it undergoing its record-breaking series of cannon rolls. Hats off to MI6 for coming up with a replacement in the 39 seconds between the end of this story and the beginning of "Quantum". Again, so they have Astons salted around Europe just in case?
The model:
Another reassuringly solid and heavy Corgi model. They solved the side mirror issue by making them out of rubber(!). Yes, this one has beautifully detailed, bendy side mirrors. I guess they'd be too fragile if done in metal or plastic? This one has opening doors and a quite nicely detailed interior. Also a little plastic man behind the wheel (left-hand drive?!) who looks nothing like Daniel Craig.
In the film:
An interesting-looking car. Some of the styling cues have morphed into unrecognizability (is that a word?). The head and tail lights have devolved into tiny slits and those side thingies look pretty weird. The grille has dropped down a bit, giving the car a perpetually grumpy look which, in a way, kind of jives with Craig's performance in this one. My understanding is that the car was specifically designed for the film, which is kind of cool, I suppose. Sorry, my attitude to this car is unavoidably colored by my attitude to this film. I was hoping for a standalone Bond romp without any further connection to the prior films and what I got was the opposite - a "universe-building" chapter with improbable and ridiculously trumped-up connections to the prior films and a ludicrous attempt at tying together Bond and Blofeld's "histories". At least "Die Another Day" openly embraced its ludicrousness - this film has a po-faced seriousness that belies its silly pretensions. I LOVE the opening in Mexico City, but the whole "The Dead are Alive" replacement for the gunbarrel intro sums up what I dislike about the film. Give me a standalone Bond movie! The as-yet unreleased "No Time to Die" promises more of the same, unfortunately.
Anyway, the chase from Blenheim Palace through Rome is exciting, if marred by silly humor about the car being unfinished and kitted out for a different agent. The labeled rocker switches are so improbable a transitional state for the equipment that any humor falls flat. The design of the car, while beautiful, is so outlandish that it makes one wonder what use it would serve for a "secret" agent.
The model:
I guess this is necessarily a Bond tie-in, given that the car was designed for the film. The Corgi model beautifully renders both the fluid forms and the crisp edges of the vehicle - those contrasts are what make the design pleasing to me.