Top 10 Movie Cars of All Time

When a vehicle eclipses the flesh-and-bone actors and becomes the superstar of a film—that's when it's a great movie car. There are dozens of memorable cars in film, but to crack the top 10, a vehicle must influence a generation, inspire car culture, and become the stuff of every kid's dreams. These are our favorites, in no particular order.

1964 Aston Martin DB5, Goldfinger

James Bond's legacy of famous cars and far-out gadgets can be traced back from one car — the 1964 Aston Martin DB5 007 driven in Goldfinger and Thunderball. Without any Bond spy modifications, the Aston Martin DB5 is a work of art. But it's the special effects that have made this car quite possibly the most beloved movie car of all time. The long list of cool tricks included ram bumper, machine guns, ejector seat, smoke screen, oil-slick sprayer and more. Looking back on the Aston from today's perspective, the most interesting feature may be the map screen in Bond's car, which foreshadowed today's navigation systems.

So just how influential and significant is the original Bond car? One of the few Astons used in those movies sold last year for a whopping $4.6 million.

Batmobile/Tumbler, Batman Begins

Like Bond cars, Batmobiles, in all their permutations, have transcended generations and remain cool. But the tough, militaristic Batmobile Tumbler that has appeared in Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins and The Dark Knight is the most visually and technically significant Batmobile since the George Barris-designed 1960s version. A beefy 350-cid Chevy V-8 powers the tank-like Tumbler to 60 mph in around 5 seconds, even with 37-inch off-road tires, according to the filmmakers. The front tires are mounted to an independent front suspension with around 30 inches of suspension travel. And the body is said to be made of more then 65 carbon-fiber panels.

What makes the Tumbler cooler than most movie props these days is, simply, that it's a real thing, not a computer-animated fantasy. We certainly dig that.

1977 Pontiac Trans Am, Smokey and the Bandit

When Smokey and the Bandit director Hal Needham, chose a 1977 Pontiac Trans Am to star in his movie alongside Burt Reynolds and Sally Field, he couldn't have predicted the impact that car would have on America.

The Trans Am actually looked more or less the same for more than a half decade before the film debuted. But that didn't matter. When audiences saw that Trans Am slide around corners, leap over broken bridges and evade Sheriff Buford T. Justice (Jackie Gleason) for hundreds of miles, they wanted a black and gold T/A in their garage. After the movie debuted, sales leapt by about 30,000 cars from 1977 to 1978 and by another 24,000 for 1979. Americans went nuts for the Starlight Black Special Edition paint job, the T-Top roof, and the fact that the car was quicker and better handling than the Corvette of the same generation. It was probably a combination of all three — plus a heaping dollop of Burt's star appeal — that made the Trans Am a legend.

1976 Lotus Esprit Series I, The Spy Who Loved Me

One more Bond car, because it's a classic.

By the 1970s the voluptuous shapes of sports cars from the 1950s and1960s gave way to distinctive and futuristic wedge designs. Pointy cars like the Lancia Stratos and Lamborghini Countach changed the automotive landscape. But neither one of them were ever driven by James Bond.

In The Spy Who Loved Me, the secret agent drove the white Series I Lotus Esprit hard. Yet the moment that sticks in everyone's mind is when the car transforms into a submarine after Bond jumps the car into the water. The Lotus sprouts stabilizer fins and props, and later, it drives up onto the beach as it morphs back into a car — with beachgoers staring slack-jawed.

'32 Ford Coupe, American Graffiti

A few years before Star Wars, George Lucas shot American Graffiti, a reflection of his memories of the car culture in California in the 1960s. Besides a cast that included future mega-stars such as Ron Howard, Harrison Ford and Richard Dreyfus, the movie had some great hot rods. But only one has become the most recognized Deuce Coupe in the world.

The brash Canary yellow '32 Ford highboy is powered by a Chevy 327 V8, and sits a little tall in the rear for some seriously cool rake. The climatic drag race on Paradise Road pits Paul Le Mat (John Milner) in the '32 Ford against an equally tough-looking '55 Chevy driven by Bob Falfa (Harrison Ford). The '32 Ford smokes the Chevy off the line, and halfway down the road the Chevy flies off the road, flips and blows. It's an amazing special effects scene, but in reality the same '55 Chevys in this movie would appear (painted flat gray) in another car movie classic, Two Lane Blacktop.