Cartorque Vol 16 - ‘Movie Cars’
There are cars, and then there are cars. The sort that don’t merely get you from A to B, but lodge themselves permanently in your brain like the smell of warm oil and old leather. Movie cars live in that space. They are not transport. They are characters. Sometimes they even act better than the humans.
And at the very top of this petrol-soaked Olympus sits the Aston Martin DB5 from Goldfinger.
Now, on paper, the DB5 is just a handsome 1960s British grand tourer. Polite. Refined. Something your successful uncle might have bought after a good year in insurance. But then Bond got his hands on it, and suddenly it wasn’t a car anymore it was a rolling declaration of intent. Machine guns behind the indicators, ejector seat, bulletproof rear shield, oil slicks, smoke screens… frankly the only thing it didn’t have was a kettle. It was cool because it made British engineering look lethal and classy. Like turning up to a fistfight in a tailored Savile Row suit and still winning. Bond didn’t chase villains in it he hunted them. And ever since, every Aston Martin has lived in its shadow, desperately hoping to be half as suave.
Then there’s the DeLorean from Back to the Future, which proves that if you bolt enough nonsense onto a deeply flawed car, it becomes brilliant. Let’s be honest: the DeLorean DMC-12 was not a good car. It wasn’t fast. It wasn’t particularly well made. And it had doors that made parking a nightmare. But add a flux capacitor, a mad scientist, and the ability to travel through time at exactly 88 miles per hour, and suddenly it’s immortal. What made it cool was the absurdity, stainless steel bodywork, sci-fi noises, and the idea that the most important vehicle in the history of the universe was powered by plutonium and optimism. You didn’t want to own it. You wanted to escape the space-time continuum in it.
America, of course, does cool differently. Loudly. Enter the Ford Mustang GT Fastback from Bullitt. No gadgets. No lasers. No time travel. Just Steve McQueen, a green Mustang, and the greatest car chase ever filmed. This car was cool because it didn’t need to explain itself. It didn’t squeal tyres for attention, it thundered. The Mustang was raw, aggressive, and unapologetically mechanical. It jumped hills, bounced off suspension stops, and looked magnificent doing it. This was the moment the movie car stopped being fantasy and became a blueprint for how you should drive in your head every time you merge onto a motorway.
And then we have KITT from Knight Rider, which answers the age-old question: what if your car was faster than most things on the road and constantly judging you? The Pontiac Trans Am was already a wedge-shaped symbol of 1980s excess, but giving it artificial intelligence, a red scanning light, and a voice that sounded like your calmest friend made it iconic. KITT was cool because he was loyal, indestructible, and could do 200 miles an hour while having a philosophical conversation. Every child watching wanted that car. Not to drive but to bond with.
Batman, naturally, took things to a completely unhinged level. The Batmobile has had many forms, but the 1989 Tim Burton version is the one that mattered. Long, black, ridiculous, and clearly designed by someone who had never once worried about speed bumps. It was cool because it looked like it came from another planet and existed purely to terrify criminals. No boot space. No cup holders. Just vengeance on wheels. Subtlety was not invited.
And that’s the point. Famous movie cars are cool not because they’re practical, or sensible, or even particularly good cars. They’re cool because they represent something bigger. Freedom. Power. Rebellion. Style. Or in Bond’s case, the idea that even when everything is exploding around you, you can still straighten your tie, fire a missile from your headlamp, and drive off without breaking a sweat.
In real life, cars get stuck in traffic and need new tyres. In films, they become legends. And deep down, every petrolhead knows the truth: we don’t just want to drive them.
We want to be the person driving them
Adam Woodruff
Writer
