Stopped Motion

Ray Harryhausen, who offered movie-goers more engaging experiences than any CGI technician can dream of, has died at the age of 92. The visual effects pioneer learned at the side of Willis O’Brien, the man who brought King Kong to life. After serving in World War II in the special services corps under Colonel Frank Capra and alongside composer Dimitri Tiomkin and Ted "Dr. Seuss" Geisel, Harryhausen and O’Brien collaborated on Mighty Joe Young and won an Academy Award for special effects. Dealing with tiny budgets for what were considered “B” pictures at the time, and have long since eclipsed the “A” pictures considered superior at the time, Harryhausen revolutionized movie-making with his form of stop-motion miniature model animation known as “Dynamation” that in many scenes allowed actors to interact with the models to add a greater sense of realism. He started with The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, based on a short story by his lifelong friend Ray Bradbury. The third member of their decades-long geek triumvirate was sci-fi historian Forrest J. Ackerman. Among his more famous creations are the dueling skeletons in Jason and the Argonauts; the 6-armed (due to budget) octopus that attacked San Francisco in It Came From Beneath the Sea; Ymir, the Venusian that terrorized Rome in 20 Million Miles to Earth; Gwangi, from a reboot of Mighty Joe Young with an allosaur instead of a monkey; the Kraken from Clash of the Titans (we will not speak of the stupid owl); and the destruction of Washington, DC in Earth vs. The Flying Saucers. His influence on other filmmakers was profound, with Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Peter Jackson, George Lucas, John Landis and Nick Park of Wallace and Gromit fame all admitting to standing on the shoulders of his genius. Among the tributes paid him are the stop-motion animated monster Nesuahyrrah at the end of Flesh Gordon, a sushi restaurant in Monsters, Inc named Harryhausen’s, a Celtic secret society book in Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed that included "Harry Hausen" as a previous owner; a piano listed as being a Harryhausen brand in Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride; and by Burton again with Mars Attacks!, especially a scene in which one of the aliens knock down the Washington Monument.