...you’re not thinkin’ of—
I sure am, boy!…
AMC Hornet – The Man with The Golden Gun (1974)
When Bond needs a car to pursue Scaramanga through the streets of Bangkok, he steals the Hornet from an AMC dealership showroom, smashing it through the plate glass window, darting in and out of traffic. The car contains no optional extras except Sheriff JW Pepper, fresh from Live and Let Die. During the pursuit, Bond discovers that he has missed a turn, and Scaramanga’s AMC Matador is safely on the other side of a Thai canal—a klong. To attempt to catch his prey, Bond leaps the car using a partially collapsed wooden bridge, performing a stunning precision barrel roll, allowing the chase to continue.
For a modest hatchback, it may seem remarkable that an AMC Hornet was chosen for one of motion picture history’s greatest car stunts. The Astro Spiral, as it’s called, was first performed by driver Charles Galiano at the Houston Astrodome in 1972. This came after a nearly five-year research program led by Raymond McHenry at Cornell Aeronautical Lab in Buffalo (renamed CALSPAN before filming The Man with the Golden Gun).
Cubby Broccoli hired W. J. Milligan Jr., the thrill show operator who worked with McHenry’s company to bring the Astro Spiral into reality. Milligan worked as Stunt Co-ordinator on the film, and even received credit for his company, American Thrill Show for furnishing stunt drivers for car chase and Astro Spiral leap.
While the Astro Spiral jump gets most of the attention, Milligan and his crew performed an array of risky stunts including high-speed cornering in close traffic, a J-turn (a 180-degree spin from reverse to forward at speed), dry skids, and many other maneuvers, often in Bangkok traffic that included both stunt drivers and (hopefully at a safe distance) regular traffic unaware that a feature film was being shot while they drove. Milligan, unfamiliar with film techniques, was game for anything. In an interview in 1995, he said, “I went up on [a median] island, and I drove about a quarter of a mile on an island with two wheels on the road...and two wheels up on the dirt island. And while I’m driving, I can hear the producers and the director screaming, ‘Jay, go, it’s great! Keep going!’ So, there were a couple of unreasonable [stunts we performed in traffic], but as a stunt person, being paid very well by Cubby Broccoli…I think, we all put our lives on the line to make this look great…And it did.”
The Foundation’s “street-chase” Hornet was acquired in July 2001.
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