(COPY) - A car fit for an international spy
Here's an example of some copy I wrote for an internship I applied for. The task was to produce a 600-800 word piece on vehicles. So i chose to put the task and something i'm passionate about together, and came up with this copy on Bond cars. I have made it to the interview stage of this internship, which will take place mid November.
What do you
get when you add a classic car from the 70’s and a bridge? The AMC Hornet X. When you add James Bond
into the equation, you get a magnificent car stunt that will be remembered
throughout time. (Visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hh0VF6s-UYU to see the Hornet in action)
The stunt couldn’t have been done without the right car. The Hornet’s
engineering had the perfect weight distribution and acceleration to get to its
calculated 40mph launch speed, to perform the corkscrew successfully first
time. This would have been very difficult to perform in any other car.
“Ejector seat? You’re joking!” That’s Sean Connery’s line
that kept viewers glued to their seats throughout 007s’ third film instalment
in ‘Goldfinger’. The ejector seat was one of the many gadgets installed in the Aston Martin DB5, allowing the car to
stand out from its predecessors the gadgetless Sunbeam Alpine and Bentley Mark
IV.
The DB series was named after David Brown, head of Aston
Martin from 1947-1962. Reclining seats, electric windows, a full leather trim and
chrome wire wheels came as standard. On top of these features, it also reached 0-60mph
in eight seconds, perfect for Bond to make a quick getaway.
An additional memorable Bond car is the Lotus Esprit S1. Unlike previous Bond cars at the time, this car
lacked power. Having said this, it was viewed as having had the best steering of
any Esprit and could still reach 133mph.
Like Connery’s DB5, this car gained
its fame when Rodger Moore was put behind the wheel in 1977 in ‘The spy who loved me’, where it famously converted itself
into a submarine. This certainly wowed the audience when they saw it on the big
screen. Perry Ocenangraphic, a company based in Riviera Beach, Florida, carried
out the submarine body work which was reported to cost around half a million
dollars. Interestingly, the car went under the hammer last month and was sold
at auction for £550,000. Higher than the price it was made, but £400,000 less
than expected.
Not all Bond cars looked great and had amazing gadgets though.
In 1981, a bright yellow Citroën 2CV appeared
in ‘For your eyes only’. With its poor performance, it flipped over whilst
turning a corner during a car chase. However, all was not lost as the small, lightweight
car was tipped back over by the towns’ people. This scene was made possible as
the body was constructed with an aircraft-style tube framework underneath a
very thin steel shell. This also gave the car an unusual look, giving it the
nickname ‘Upside-down pram’ by the British public. Even with an embarrassing nickname
and poor performance, the car still saved our favourite spy.
So what car should appear in the next Bond film? The beloved
DB5 has featured as a Bond car six times and is arguably the favourite amongst
fans. However, we must remember before the Aston came onto our screens, Bond
owned a Bentley Mark IV as seen in ‘From
Russia with Love’. The four door standard sports saloon car, made of steel
coachwork, reached speeds of up to 100 mph, but it wasn’t actually driven by
him. Instead he made a call from the cars telephone, an unusual addition to
cars at the time.
Since then, Bentley has only made a brief appearance when Sean Connery
returned in 1983 with ‘Never say never again’. Therefore, it’s time to bring
back a newly updated Bentley. Enter the Bentley
continental GT V8 S, with its Beluga lower body styling and twenty inch
rimed wheels, a 4.0 litre V8 engine, revised stability control and an up rated
chassis with a sleek sporting appearance. Painted the right colour and with modified
gadgets, this car could convey all the right aspects that a Bond car needs. The
fact that Bentley is also British makes it perfect for 007, a true British
legend.
The last five decades have seen many cars used to fit Bond’s needs,
in order for him to complete his missions. They have varied from the glorious likes
of the Aston Martin DB5, to the not
so pretty Land Rover Defender as seen
in the latest instalment ‘Skyfall’. Needless
to say, every Bond car has lived up to its purpose; getting him out of those
tricky situations and to where he needs to be. So no matter what the next Bond car will be, there’s
one thing for sure, Bond and his fans are in for the ride of their life.
0 comments:
Post a Comment