Daniel Craig as 007
After serving Queen and country on screen for 50 years, James Bond has been recognised as the top movie franchise of all time in a poll of film fans, beating the likes of Star Wars, Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter.
To celebrate the release of the long-awaited Prometheus, Ridley Scott's latest blockbuster in the Alien franchise on 1st June, LOVEFiLM polled over 2,900 film fans to determine the UK's most popular film franchise of all time. Almost a fifth (18 per cent) picked 007.
In a further victory for movie classics, Star Wars came second in the poll with 16 per cent of the vote. Fewer than 40 cinemas were originally willing to screen the first movie in 1977, despite the fact that the franchise has gone on to gross over £2 billion at the box office.
The epic Lord of the Rings trilogy charmed its way into third place with 15 per cent of the vote. The movies, based on J.R.R.Tolkien's literary classics, may have failed to rule them all this time, but with two further sequels based on The Hobbit set to be released at the end of 2012 and 2013 respectively, the franchise shows no signs of disappearing.
Despite becoming the highest grossing franchise of all time, the six Harry Potter movies were edged out of the top three, flying into fourth place in the poll with 11% of the vote.
The connections of the Corleone mafia family were unable to sway the poll in favour of The Godfather, which came fifth with 7 per cent of the vote. The mafia gang were closely followed by the more family friendly bunch from Toy Story, the first computer generated feature length movie, whose trilogy earned five per cent of the vote.
Alien, which first burst onto screens in 1979, took seventh place in the poll with four per cent of the vote. The film has been deemed the 'unofficial prequel' to Ridley Scott's Prometheus, with the action set to take place in the same late 21st Century fictional universe.
Timeless classic Batman, who made his first appearance on the big screen in 1943, leapt into eighth place taking the title of top comic book movie franchise, despite the recent release of Marvel's Avengers Assemble, whose franchise came ninth in the list. Tenth place was boldly secured by Star Trek, whose eleven feature films took two per cent of the vote.
The top ten favourite movie franchises of all time according to members of LOVEFiLM are
1. James Bond - 18%
2. Star Wars - 16%
3. Lord of the Rings - 15%
4. Harry Potter - 11%
5. The Godfather - 7%
6. Toy Story - 5%
7. Alien - 4%
8. Batman - 3%
9. Marvel's Avengers - 2%
10. Star Trek - 2%
Other - 17%
Helen Cowley, Editor of LOVEFiLM, commented: "Despite tough competition from some of the biggest grossing film franchises, James Bond has proved his timeless appeal, which is only likely to grow ahead of the latest release, Skyfall, in October as we celebrate all things British this summer.
"We can become quite attached to characters and stories so it is no surprise that there is so much demand to turn a hit movie into a franchise."
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