Bond has the best car

A new survey has found that James Bond's amphibious Lotus Esprit is Britain's favourite screen car.

11:38 27 July 2004

A new survey has found that James Bond's amphibious Lotus Esprit is Britain's favourite screen car.

The white Bond car - fitted with depth charges, missiles, oil sprays and capable of travelling underwater - topped a list including such legendary vehicles as the Batmobile and the time-travelling Delorean from the "Back to the Future" trilogy.

Strangely, respondents to the poll by Yahoo! Search found no place in their top ten for Bond's famous Aston Martin DB5 from "Goldfinger".

Second place in the survey went to KITT (the Knight Industries Two Thousand), the talking supercar from American TV series "Knight Rider".

The flux-capacitor carrying DeLorean from "Back to the Future" was in third, while Batman's Batmobile - complete with voice-activated controls and retractable armour - came in fourth.

British engineering - this time not associated with Q-Branch - made it into the top five again, with the fleet of Mini Coopers used by Michael Caine in "The Italian Job" coming in fifth.

Smaller cars featured again with Herbie along with Del Boy's Robin Reliant, both in the top ten.

Yahoo! Search spokesman Patrick Oqvist said: "Although there's loads of classic film vehicles out there, our search for the favourite has shown James Bond's modified Lotus Esprit from The Spy Who Loved Me' a worthy winner."

The top ten:
1 - Lotus Esprit from the Spy Who loved Me (1977)
2 - KITT from Knight Rider (1982-1986)
3 - DeLorean from Back To The Future (1985)
4 - Batmobile from Batman (1989)
5 - Minis from The Italian Job (1969)
6 - Gran Torino from Starsky & Hutch (2004)
7 - A-Team Van from The A-Team (1983-1987)
8 - Danny Zuko's Grease Lightning from Grease (1978)
9 - Herbie from Herbie Goes Bananas (1980)
10 - Robin Reliant from Only Fools & Horses (1981-2003)