Daniel Craig moves to Surrey, England, but no Aston Martin in sight

James Bond has moved into my next-door village - reports Jeremy Hart for the National Post. Jogging by women in this part of affluent Surrey, England is up 900%. I've not been to the local beauty parlour, but parking near there is at more of a premium than ever. Ownership of dogs to walk innocently past Daniel Craig's new pad seems to have rocketed and the paparazzi has turned the rundown local pub into a booming business.

Reports, though, of him driving an Aston Martin around the leafy roads south of London are much exaggerated. Unlike his predecessor, Pierce Brosnan, who fell in love so much with the Vanquish he used in Die Another Day that he ended up with one in his garage, Craig seems to not have been bitten by the Aston bug. In fact, in Casino Royale, he spends more time in the new Ford Mondeo than the new Aston Martin DBS, which is worrying.

Matching Bond to his car is a fine art. Roger Moore in the Lotus Esprit worked. Sean Connery in the DB5 was perfection, of course. But Brosnan in the Vanquish was like casting Sylvester Stallone in Midsummer Night's Dream. It was hard, he was soft. It was raw, he was pretty.

The last Bond car I had driven was Brosnan's Vanquish -- the hero car from the movie, complete with hood-popping machine guns and red-tipped rockets! It cost £1.25-million to turn the Vanquish into a film star. Shot on a glacier in Iceland, the monster had to be turned into a 4WD. So out came the V12, in went a Ford V8 and drive was added to the front two wheels.

I was under strict instructions not to try and replicate the spins, jumps and barrel rolls of the shoot in Iceland. Instead, the twisty mountainous Alpine Course at Millbrook test track in the English Midlands was my film set.

The Alpine Course requires maximum attention. The Vanquish is a handful. But the four-wheel drive hugged the tarmac like an affectionate sumo wrestler. I threw it at the scenery, but it refused to go there. No amount of ducking or diving, bobbing or weaving made the Vanquish cower.

The next time a Bond Aston appeared on screen it was Craig's DBS in Casino Royale. And, unlike me, he managed to get it well and truly unglued -- in a spectacular way. Seven rolls the DBS achieved as Craig swerved to avoid running over his on-screen love interest.

For the dent crashing the Aston did to Bond's image, he might as well have flopped in bed. For almost half a century, 007 has driven as well as he seduces. Along with always getting the bad guy, it's why men put up with his magnetism.

The odds are he will get another shot at proving his driving prowess in the DBS in the next Bond movie. Which will be good. The match of Craig and DBS has the ability to gel as well as any 007 since Connery and the DB5.

Craig's Bond is the human equivalent of the DBS. Harder, leaner, more complex and less waffling than previous 007s. Just as the DBS is more efficient, chiselled and precise than almost any previous Aston.

Aston says the DBS is no replacement for the Vanquish. But with 510 horsepower (only 10 less than the Vanquish) and a price tag that outguns the DB9 and the V8 Vantage, the DBS has taken its top spot in the Aston arsenal. But there the similarities end.

The Vanquish was brutish and thrived on a muscularity and brawn that commanded respect. Sure, it could top 200 miles per hour, but it would leave you quaking in the process. The DBS delivers its almost comparable power with the poise and stealth of a ballet dancer wielding a machete.

"I think of the DBS as a muscular Carl Lewis," says its designer, Marek Reichman. "The impression of power is there without being overtly muscular."

Reichman defends using the same overt design lineage for the DBS as the other As-tons. "Why change something that has a beautiful face?" he argues. But Aston needs to find some new form from its family resemblance. The upcoming Rapide four-seater is a braver step away from the DB9, DBS and V8 DNA, but not too brave.

Compared with the DB9, the DBS has rippling muscles. It bulges and squats on its haunches more than the sleeker and slower middle Aston sibling.

Liberal use of carbon fibre, hood scoops, side skirts and race-style aerodynamic splitters are hints at the DBS' credo of race-inspired sophistication. The carbon drops the weight to 65 kilograms below the DB9. But, at 1,695 kg, it is no flyweight and the 510 hp is necessary to light the nearly-two-ton touch-paper.

The V12 in the DBS is sensational. It revs freely, packs house-demolishing torque all the way up the six-speed manu-al gear range. And it sounds divine. Aston has linked it to the four Pirellis through a set of adjustable dampers to give the driver a setting that suits every asphalt surface. The sports setting is too hard unless the surface is billiard table smooth.

The DBS is too big to clamber up twisty rally stage roads like the V8 or an Impreza. It is much more at home on fast, sweeping rural highways -- the kind that cling to valley bottoms and kiss the apex of buttressing cliff faces. And on trans-continental freeways, it devours swathes of the Earth's surface in a single sitting.

Progressive traction control, pinpoint precise steering and perfect 50-50 balance turn this from a boulevardier with a bloody big engine to a GT with race breeding. There are no other supercars that will eat continents, tip toe across congested cities, lap Le Mans without embarrassment ?and play a role in a Bond movie.

Aston was happy with the minimal exposure of the DBS in Casino Royale. The company's boss, Ulrich Bez, says you cannot always expect car chases when Bond gets behind the wheel. And Bez seems confident Bond will continue to use an Aston in the future.

"I can't tell you if Bond will be driving an Aston Martin in the next movie," says Bez. "He does not need us and we do not need him, but there is a good chance. We are having a love affair."

If Britain was down to its last spy, it should hope that that last man standing would be Bond ? and that by his side would be an Aston Martin. Anything else would not be cricket.

Thanks to `Kirby Girl` for the alert.

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