Golden gun

The golden gun is the one of the most iconic guns in modern cinema. It is one of the James Bond series firearms, used in "The Man with the Golden Gun" 1965 novel and 1974 film. It is used by the villain, Francisco Scaramanga, but not by James Bond.

Differences

In Ian Fleming's novel, the golden gun is a gold-plated Colt Peacemaker .45-calibre revolver.

For the film, the gun was a single-shot weapon that fires a custom-made 4.2-millimeter golden (23-carat gold with traces of nickel) dum-dum bullet. The instant kill technology relies on the bullet shattering akin to a fragmentation grenade. Scaramanga uses such a weapon to emphasize his peerless skill as a pistol marksman and the fact that he needs only one bullet to kill a target.

Features

The gun separates into a gold cigarette lighter, a gold cigarette case, a gold cuff link, and a gold pen so as to avoid detection. The pen operates as the barrel, the lighter creates the bullet chamber, the cufflink is used as the trigger and the cigarette case forms the butt of the gun.

Usage

Scaramanga used the golden gun in numerous assassinations of officials, political enemies, gangsters, and a 00-agent, Bill Fairbanks (002). Scaramanga later used the golden gun to kill British scientist Gibson and Scaramanga's own employer, Hai-Fat. But when Scaramanga was killed, and his island destroyed, the golden gun was presumably also lost.

Popularity in Games

It was featured in the video game "Goldeneye 007" in a multiplayer scenario, The Man with the Golden Gun. Only one player could have the gun at a time, either acquired by picking it up at the initial location or from killing a player who had it. If a player was shot by a golden bullet anywhere on their body they would instantly die. The gold weapon was also used in the game's Egyptian level (which required completion of all other of the game's levels to be completed on the hardest difficulty to unlock, even the Aztec level), locked away in a shatter-proof glass box which required completion of a puzzle in order to unlock. The gun was needed to defeat the level's boss, Baron Samedi, which had so much health he could withstand several of the one-shot-killer bullets and had to be killed three times as well.

Because of the popularity of both the game and the weapon itself it was later to be featured in future James Bond video games such as "The World Is Not Enough", ', ', ', ', and "From Russia with Love". Many of these games also feature golden variations of other weapons (such as the Walther PPK, Walther P99, and a rocket launcher).

Japanese video game director Suda51 has also been known to pay homage to the golden gun in his games, most notable 2005's "killer7" as used by Emir Parkreiner, and 2008's "No More Heroes" as used by Dr. Peace.

Theft

[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/beds/bucks/herts/7665014.stm The golden gun has been stolen] from the company Elstree Props which is based in Elstree Studios in Hertfordshire. The prop which has been estimated to have a worth of £80,000 was discovered missing on Friday 10^th October 2008.

External links

* [http://www.colibri-shop.co.uk/about.php]