Damian Lewis and an F-type – the chaps at Jaguar know how to get the top slot on Woman Driver Blog. 
   The Homeland star will play the lead in a short film called Desire created by Jaguar and Ridley Scott Associates. The breathy, almost Donna-Summer-naughty, music is by Lana Del Rey, the track Burning Desire being inspired by (or commissioned for, perhaps) the F-type. In my book it’s better that Adele’s Skyfall.
   Desire starts filming on location in the Chilean desert at the beginning of December, and will be directed by Adam Smith, the man who called the shots on Matt Smith’s debut season as Dr Who. The female lead is Shannyn Sossamon, I’m afraid the only film I’d seen from her bio was A Knight’s Tale, but she’d done lots of indy films. The baddy is Jordi Molla, who is famous in Spain, and was in Bad Boys II, (I haven’t seen it, but I have seen Hot Fuzz, so I’m impressed).
   In the press release Damian Lewis commented: "When Jaguar approached me about the F-TYPE Desire film I was really intrigued. I then got to read the script and decided it was definitely a project I wanted to be a part of. Working with the director Adam Smith from Ridley Scott Associates, it promises to be an adventure. Jaguar cars have played some iconic roles in film for many years and I'm looking forward to being the first to drive the F-TYPE in film."
   The film tells the story of Clark, played by Lewis (Lewis and Clark - was that deliberate?), who delivers cars for a living, running into trouble after a chance encounter with a mysterious, young woman in the middle of a lawless desert. It’s billed as a story of betrayal, retribution, passion and greed.
   Despite the casting of a Brit in a car with British heritage, the film seems angled at the other side of the pond, from the moment it opens with a suitcase full of US dollars being blown away on the wind. Jaguar still needs to fight hard to win over American buyers. The unreliable E-type was a big joke in the last series of Mad Men. Spoiler alert! One character can’t even kill himself in one because it won’t start.
    Jaguar has promised to release exclusive content from the set itself in Chile’s Atacama Desert, I’ll keep an eye on it.

See the teaser and a car-racing video at www.ftype.com/desire

Click here for a list of E-type appearances on film

Our Mini One D has completed its first proper road trip, driving from Wiltshire to Northumberland to join Richard's family on holiday.
   I was impressed we got a week's worth of luggage in the back once we folded the back seats. Mind you, when we took an an elderly aunt out for lunch on the way home, it took a bit of reorganising. (We folded a seat down and I squeezed into it – we didn't stow her in the back.)
    We are still seething because we paid a heap of money to get the Pepper Pack, mainly to avoid the usual CD wars. The PP would allow us to plug in an iPod and listen to a carefully negotiated playlist during our regular six-hour journeys up north. Even better, we could control the iPod through the car's audio controls – very clever. No one pointed out that we would have to buy a special lead costing another forty quid in order to do this. We've bought one on eBay now, but it didn't arrive in time.
   Luckily the DAB radio let us listen 6Music all the way, with only a couple of short break-ups, so we didn't fight.
   We were both impressed but how quiet and smooth the drive was, but in the morning – ooh my back. The seats aren't as supportive as they could be.
    For a week we pottered around the gorgeous coastline of Northumberland. We worried a bit about the salt water as we crossed the causeway to Lindisfarne. Then we thought, ha ha, it's a on a PCP, we'll be giving it back in three years' time.
   I had several opportunities to drive the Mini down some wonderful twisty country lanes, being rewarded by views of the sea emerging from behind hills and sand dunes. On such roads, I always pine for my MX-5, but this time I even missed our previous Mini Cooper S.
   The diesel pulls well, but you have to change gear so often it's like stirring a heavy Christmas pudding. Our Mazda6 is pretty flexible, but if I came round a bend to find a hill, a broken surface or a tractor, I'd have to change down to second to stop it bogging down. If you don't, anything behind you gets big in the rear screen very rapidly. The flat seats mean you roll around a lot, too. Ooh my back, again.
   By the time we got home, the mileage was close to 3,000. Our usual commuting economy is 53.8mpg to 54.5, but on the motorway it just kissed 60mpg. Of course, that's why we bought it. But I don't love it.

Click here to see the story of buying the Mini

Here's a 'big mouth gallery' to follow up on my piece yesterday about the Mazda MX-5 and the current 'open wide!' fashion. Some motors may be in danger of swallowing themselves if they go too fast (like the Pink Panther and vacuum cleaner).

The press release for the face-lifted MX-5 announced proudly that it has a 'more a aggressive look'.Really? Why, of all cars, does the MX5 need an aggressive look? Its original design team were searching for oneness of horse and rider, not lion and tamer. It's always been cute and it always been popular with both sexes – why mess with that?
   In fact, looking at the picture of the new deep grille, I’m afraid the MX-5 looks as it’s having a belly laugh at our expense. Aggressive, it ain't. In fact, it's looking less like a Lotus Elan and more like a Frogeye Sprite. (Or Bugeye if you prefer to call this car a Miata.)
   I’m afraid Mazda has become a fashion victim. I can hear its parents saying "Just because everyone else is wearing flared trousers, it doesn't mean you have to.
I don't know if I'm right, but I tend to blame Audi for all the gaping maws on the road these days. At least a huge mouth looks right on an Audi. It looks ridiculous on Peugeots. I'll see if I get used to it on the MX-5.
   That aside, we’re promised  even better handling and responsiveness, plus the bonnet pops up in a front-end accident to meet European pedestrian safety regulations.
Click here for more MX-5 pictures

Monisha Kaltenborn (left) become Formula One's first female team principal in Octobe, and Susie Wolff has become development driver at Williams – can we expect to see more women in F1 cars any time soon?

Click here for full story.

As Skyfall fever rages, the boys are all talking about Bond cars, lusting over the Aston with the ejector seat or wondering about how they made that Lotus drive underwater in the days before CGI. But I reckon some of the best cars were driven by the Bond girls.
Click here for full story and pics