Top 5 film gadgets that now exist (in some form)

Fuelled by Hollywood, I thought that when I was older I'd be taking a jet pack to work. Apparently the future isn't panning out quite as I'd expected. It’s not all bad news though, as there are in fact plenty of film inspired gadgets that you can now have for real.

Here are my top 5 films with gadgets that are now a reality, what are yours?

Star Wars - The Force: From the moment Obi-Wan Kenobi advised Luke to use the Force it sounded like something I wanted. No gimmicks or gadgets just the power of the mind. Who didn't want to go home and use the Jedi mind trick on their mum, maybe that’s going to far over to the dark side! Now we’ve got devices like the G.tec intendix that allow us just that. The power of the mind to move a ball through a hoop? It’s not what Obi-Wan had in mind but it’ll have to do… for now.

Back to the Future 2 - Hoverboard: Possibly the best gadget from a film ever! Who didn't want one of these? I didn’t know how it was powered, how to steer it, I just knew I had to have one, even if it didn’t work over water. Well we’re not quite there yet but the chaps at Five's Gadget Show have figured out how you can make one yourself.

James Bond, Thunderball - Jet Pack: The ultimate in personal transportation. Although I’m not old enough to have seen this in the cinema, watching the opening sequence on Thunderball on TV still had enough of an impact to tell me everything I needed to know about how I would be getting around in 30 years time. If you have a few (thousand) pounds to spare you can place an order for your very own Martin jet pack. Not quite in shops yet.

Star Trek - Communicators: Federation-issue communicators with their gold flip cover were oh so achingly cool on Captain Kirk, but no so much when Motorola delivered its own take in 1989, heralding the onslaught of personal mobile communications in the 1990’s. It took them a little while to get closer, but the Motorola Razr fitted the bill pretty well.

Superman - X-ray vision: From comics to TV to film, the must have super power for schoolboys across the globe was X-ray vision. Many school changing room discussions will have ended at the same conclusion.  But at last, every schoolboy's dream has become a reality at your local airport with their Backscatter X-ray machines. Almost like magic.

What are your favourite film-gadgets-that-now-sort-of-exist? Let me know in the comments.