Jaguar C-X75 Bond Villain Car Expected to Fetch $1.2M at RM Sotheby’s Auction
The ultra-advanced hypercar never saw full-fledged production, making this example one rare bird.
James Bond films are famously known for their exquisite selection of on-screen cars. It's easy to picture 007 speeding along in the driver's seat of an Aston Martin while deploying some sort of secret gadget, but sometimes the most interesting piece of sheet metal isn't what Bond is piloting—rather, it's the thoughtful choice of car made for the villain.
In the 2015 hit movie Spectre, one particular vehicle made its way onto the silver screen: the Jaguar C-X75. And while it never came to fruition as a production supercar, Jaguar did build several examples for the movie, one of which you can bid on at an auction hosted by RM Sotheby's in Abu Dhabi next month.
Designed by none other than Ian Callum and built by Williams Advanced Engineering, the C-X75 was nothing short of a Picasso on wheels. From concept, Jaguar had dreams of the C-X75 being a limited-run hybrid sports car to compete with the likes of the Porsche 918 and McLaren P1. Sadly, however, these plans fell through.
When word that the production team from Spectre was looking for a menacing car for the villain of an upcoming Bond flick, Jaguar saw an opportunity to steal the spotlight from Aston Martin and showcase the vision of its stalled project. The automaker jumped on the opportunity and, together with Williams, designed several additional examples which were essentially a C-X75 body sat atop a reinforced, custom tubular chassis. Note the race-car-like interior with a left-handed sequential paddle shifter and huge hydraulic handbrake.
In addition to structural modifications, the power plant found in the car was also re-engineered. The hybrid setup was swapped in favor of a rear-mounted dry-sump variant of the F-Type's supercharged V8, and while horsepower isn't explicitly mentioned, we'd imagine that the engine's output is quite generous.
This chassis served life as one of four stunt cars for Spectre. More specifically, it was built to be a pod car—a vehicle that would be operated via a "pod" fitted to the roof so that the talent could be filmed while relinquishing control of the vehicle to a secondary driver who operated the vehicle's controls from the pod.
After the film, the Jaguar was sent around the world to promote it, including an event in Mexico where individuals, including former Williams Racing driver Felipe Massa, could drive the car on a test track.
After its short factory-sponsored world tour, the C-X75 was sold to a private collector who had served as a consultant to Jaguar in 2016. Under their ownership, the car was trotted across Europe to various vehicle-related sporting events, accruing only "a handful of miles".
If you're an uber-rich collector who always wanted to own a C-X75 but was decimated when Jaguar gave up on them, now is your chance to rekindle your hopes of owning a dream car...just don't expect it to go for cheap. The hammer is expected to land anywhere between $800,000 and $1.2 million on this rare piece. Only one other C-X75 has gone up for sale in recent years for an unknown price.
