THE iconic Aston Martin driven by film legend James Bond was today voted the best car ever in films.

A survey showed that the Aston Martin DB5 driven by Sean Connery as 007 in the 1964 James Bond movie, Goldfinger, was the most noted car on the big screen.

And that put the spotlight on Huddersfield, as more than 1,000 of the DB5s were built by the Aston Martin Company, which at the time was owned by Huddersfield businessman Sir David Brown.

He, of course, was better known for the thousands of tractors he produced at the huge Meltham Mills factory and for David Brown Gears, still in the town.

The survey, from motoring and leisure association CSMA Club, showed that 32% of those taking part voted for the Aston.

And the striking DB5 was sold at RM Auctions, London, for a sky high £2.6m, earlier this year.

The car – registration number FMP 7B – came complete with gadgets devised for the films by Oscar-winning special effects expert John Stears.

They include a bullet-proof shield, revolving number plates, replica Browning machine guns hidden behind the front sidelights, a radar tracking device – decades before GPS technology – an ejector seat and an oil slick sprayer and nail spreader.

The DB5 was originally loaned to EON Productions for the filming of the two Bond movies and returned to the Aston Martin Lagonda factory after its subsequent promotional tour.

Sir David Brown bought Aston Martin and Lagonda Ltd in 1947 and the DB5 went into production in 1963.

Sir David sold the company in 1972. He died in 1993, aged 89.

Second to Bond’s Aston Martin in the survey was the DeLorean time-travelling car in the three Back To The Future films (1985-90) with Herbie, the talking car in The Love Bug (1968) third.

Another British movie – Cliff Richard’s 1963 hit Summer Holiday – also made it into the top 10 for its double-decker bus scenes.

The survey revealed that three driving sequences from The Italian Job, including Minis driving down steps, were the top motoring scenes from films over the last five decades.

Matt Damon’s car chase through Paris in the 2002 film, The Bourne Identity, was in fourth place with the car chase in the 1968 Steve McQueen movie Bullitt fifth, and Summer Holiday sixth.

Also in the top 10 was the 2000 film Gone In 60 Seconds, starring Nicolas Cage, while the car/train chase in The French Connection (1971) was also highly popular with the 2,012 UK motorists polled.