Nov 13, 2026

kottke.org

The corkscrew car jump from the Bond film The Man With...

Image: kottke.org

The Bond car jump from The Man With The Golden Gun was worked out on a computer in 1974, using equations from the 18th-century mathematician Leonhard Euler. I love that the coolest stunt in a Bond film started life as homework.

It's my favorite kind of nerd crossover: movie magic, old-school computing and a very dead mathematician all pitching in. Worth a click if you've ever yelled at the TV during a car chase and then wondered about the physics.

The corkscrew car jump from the Bond film The Man With The Golden Gun was extensively modelled on a computer in 1974. “McHenry took all the measurements and simulated the stunt using the equations of the 18th-century mathematician Leonhard Euler.”

kottke.org

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