MUCH was made of the new Land Rover Defender featuring in the latest Bond film No Time To Die, however, it was 007 who escaped from the bad guys in a battered old Toyota Land Cruiser.

Of course, the old Defender is a vehicular icon up there alongside the Jaguar E-Type and Volkswagen Beetle. And, to many people around the world, Toyota's imposing Land Cruiser is too.

Not only is its ruggedness and off-road prowess deservedly legendary, but these days it's not too bad on the tarmac too.

The main change is an upgrade to the 2.8-litre diesel engine, the output of which rises from 175bhp to 201bhp, while torque is up from 420 to an ample 500Nm. This comes matched to either a six-speed manual gearbox or smooth six-speed automatic transmission.

The UK line-up currently features two grades - Active, with three and five-door body styles and five or seven seats, and the five-door, seven-seat Invincible here.

It comes as standard with 19-inch alloys, a 360-degree camera, eight-inch infotainment touchscreen, 14-speaker surround sound audio system, triple-zone climate control, heated and ventilated front seats, heated second row seats, leather upholstery, rear privacy glass, LED headlights, and illuminated side steps. What more could you ask for?

Inside - a very comfortable place to be - there's an eight-inch centre dash infotainment screen, which now incorporates Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, while the instrument binnacle has a four-gauge layout with precision Optitron meters that flank a 4.2-inch colour digital multi-information display.

The Land Cruiser is a road-going behemoth so space for those in the second row is plentiful and even access to the rearmost third row seats is straightforward thanks to a generous 46-degree angle for the middle bench. Those third-row seats will take adults too, not just the offspring.

Drop the third row of seats and there's a handy 621 litres of luggage space available. Drop the second row and there's a van-sized 1,943 litres. All Land Cruisers can also pull 3,000kg.

Suspension modifications made to the Land Cruiser in recent years mean that stability and ride quality has improved and it settles down nicely and reasonably quietly on a motorway cruise. That said, it's still a tall, heavy car, so there a noticeable amount of lean through corners. Of course, the Land Cruiser wasn't designed to be hurried. It may be very comfortable with a high-quality interior but it remains an immensely capable off-roader able to deal with whatever is thrown in front of it.

The Invincible is more capable off-road than its sibling as it features a centre Torsen limited-slip differential. A Kinetic Dynamic Suspension System (KDSS) also uses active anti-roll bars to offer maximum body movement and therefore maximum grip, while a Multi-Terrain Select system allows you to adjust the four-wheel drive dynamics to suit different types of terrain.

There's also a Crawl Control system which enables your vehicle to pick its way slowly along very undulating ground. A Multi Terrain Monitor uses a series of cameras to display on the dash what you are tackling. Oh, there's a rear differential lock too.

Safety is also paramount. The Land Cruiser comes with seven airbags as standard and the latest Toyota Safety Sense 2 suite of active safety technologies. These include a pre-collision system that in daylight can now detect cyclists, intelligent Adaptive Cruise Control system, Lane Trace Assist which provides automatic assistance to keep the vehicle positioned within its traffic lane, alongside Lane Departure Alert and automatic high beam and a blind spot monitor with rear cross traffic alert.