The Bond car the late actor Sean Connery first drove in the 1964 film ‘Goldfinger’ was an Aston Martin DB5 filled with gadgets like machine guns, an ejection seat and an oil slick maker. Over 50 years later, Connery searched for a 1964 DB5 for himself and, after searching for over a year, finally bought one – without the movie car guns and gadgets – early 2018. Connery died almost two years later at the age of 90. His DB5, the only one he has ever owned, will go up for sale at an auction this summer.
The car is expected to sell for between $1.4 million and $1.8 million, according to auction house Broad Arrow Group. The car will be offered at Broad Arrow Group’s auction in Monterey, California on August 18 the company told CNN Business.
A 1964 Aston Martin DB5 in the pristine condition of this car would normally be worth around $1 million, even if Connery had never been around, according to Hagerty. (Hagerty, a company that tracks collector car value, is also a major investor in the recently founded Broad Arrow Group.)
During his life, Connery had often told his children about his fond memories of driving the Aston Martin in movies, his son Jason Connery said in an interview. When they were older, they suggested their father buy one, but he resisted the idea.
“He was like, ‘I don’t want to because it’s kind of obvious, you know, with me,'” Jason Connery said. “I said, ‘But forget it, it’s not about that. “”
Barney Ruprecht, an Aston Martin specialist at Broad Arrow who had also consulted with Connery on the purchase, advised Connery against getting a car in need of restoration because the work would likely take a few years, he said. Instead, he and Connery searched for a car that was in as perfect a condition as possible. The car remains in roughly this condition, according to Ruprecht, with only a few creases in the seat leather as evidence that it has been sat.
Once Connery bought the car, he had it painted from black to Snow Shadow Grey, the color of the car in the film. In the movies, the car is depicted as being painted a color called Silver Birch, but the movie was shot using a prototype DB5, not an actual production car. Silver Birch, a color that was offered on production versions of the DB5, was not available at the time, Ruprecht said, so the car was painted in the slightly flatter, less metallic shade of gray which was offered on the DB4. The two colors would have been nearly indistinguishable on film, however, he said.
But once this work was completed, there was little time left to conduct it.
“Unfortunately, as we get older, traveling, especially in Europe [became difficult] and then COVID hit and…” Jason Connery said. “You know, unfortunately, he never really got to enjoy the car he bought.”
The car was kept by Connery at his home in Switzerland, according to Jason Connery. He liked the car so much that he kept a picture of it on his desk.
A portion of the proceeds from the sale will go to support the Connery Family Philanthropy Fund, according to the Broad Arrow Group, although the percentage going to charity will be announced later. In addition to the car itself, the winning bidder will receive a ride in the car of famous retired Formula 1 racing driver Jackie Stewart.
Stewart, like Connery, is from Scotland and the two were longtime friends.
