Let’s take a few moments to mark the passing of Ray
Harryhausen, the master of stop-motion animation, who died on May 7th
at the age of 92. Ray was best known for
creating movie monsters. Not the kind
that could be played by a guy in a rubber suit with a face buried under twelve
layers of spirit gum, but mythical, sometimes grotesque, sometimes majestic, largely
nonhuman ones.
To do this he created highly
detailed miniature models, which he would pose and then photograph one frame at
a time, twenty-four different times in order to produce one second of film. If my math is correct (always a dicey
proposition), a five-minute scene would require somewhere on the order of 7,200
separate ‘shots,’ with each shot usually requiring multiple minute adjustments
to the model (or models).
And somehow, the man lived to be 92. He must have possessed the patience of Job,
along with the gumption of a sea barnacle.
The resulting animation was then typically incorporated as
seamlessly as possible into the live action of the film, so that it appeared
that some gargantuan reptile or sea monster was sharing the screen with Jason
and the Argonauts, or battling Sinbad and his crew, or conquering San Francisco , or stomping on Rome , or whatever the case may be.
If you go back and look at his work, what becomes obvious is
his attention to detail and stubborn commitment to producing the best results
possible. This wasn’t the kind of guy who
was content to glue bits of latex to a lizard and call it a Dimetrodon.
Emphatically not an example of Ray Harryhausen's skill |
Yet, although I’ve always had great respect for Harryhausen’s
work, I can’t say I’ve always been a huge fan of it. I think that’s due to timing more than
anything. My first movie experience was Star Wars, and the problem with that is the
film’s special effects were so spectacularly effective that it rendered the
inherently unbelievable perfectly believable (at least to my nine-year-old
mind). Star Wars created an artificial reality so unhindered by the obvious
presence of a magician’s hand that my imagination was completely immersed into
it, and the resulting experience was absolutely thrilling. Once that happened, once I had the
realization that such a thing was even possible,
well, there was no going back, no settling for less.
And, unfortunately, Ray’s stop-motion animation, while it
was performed at the highest possible level, could never quite clear that final
barrier to believability. His creations,
as careful and nuanced and detailed as they were, always struck me as what might
happen if Dr. Frankenstein, after his first giddy taste of success, went on a
resurrection spree and brought an entire menagerie of prehistoric monsters and mythical
beasts back to life. Plodding, stone-footed
cadences; each creature a staircase series of frozen motions, the perpetually
nagging sense of knowing that you were watching an inanimate object imitating a
living thing; those are the unfortunate constraints placed on Ray’s work.
None of which was really his fault, though; he was simply
bumping up against the ceiling of the technology that existed at the time. To his tremendous credit, he pushed the
process of stop-motion to its absolute limits, and extracted from it a certain kind
of effectiveness which no one else could quite match as successfully.
Besides, anyone with an understanding of the tedious,
precise, unforgiving nature of the work involved in model animation (setting
aside the vast array of additional problems introduced by blending animation
with live action) has to admire what he was able to accomplish. I acquired my keen sense of appreciation by making
several stop-motion films as a kid. With
Rob, my friend and partner in crime, we learned two great lessons from these
experiences. One was that making
stop-motion movies was easy; the second was that making stop-motion movies that
weren’t hopelessly cheesy was next to impossible.
At age fifteen, before learning that second lesson, I had
grand ambitions of making a stop-motion film called “A Chipka Adventure” using
my trusty Bell & Howell Super 8 camera.
The Chipkas, I feel obligated to mention, were a race of short, rotund
creatures with squat legs and arms; they were made out of modeling clay and looked
like hairless Ewoks. They lived together
in a small town set amongst some gently rolling hills where the buildings owed
their primitive, rounded architectural style entirely to The Flintstones. In the
first scene, we were to meet the Chipkas as they go about their everyday lives:
farming in the hills, sitting down at the kitchen table for breakfast, meeting
on the streets of town. They are
suddenly confronted by the appearance of a ferocious, Chipka-eating, T-rex-like
monster (that part, at least, was very much a Harryhausen inspiration). Of course, the creature begins wreaking havoc
on the town, and the small, brave Chipkas must band together and fight back to
save the clay, as it were.
Anyway, what started as a passionate attempt to tell a story
using stop-motion animation quickly degenerated into complete disaster. The problems were too many and too idiotic to
describe here, but after several tests, we concluded that our aspirations were
set too high, and returned to filming mostly explosions of Matchbox cars loaded
with firecrackers.
And that’s what separated Ray from people like me. He was that guy who refused to get
discouraged by the constant setbacks and challenges of incredibly laborious and
time-consuming work. I think it’s safe
to say that Mr. Harryhausen didn’t yield to his frustrations the first time he
discovered that modeling clay is far from an ideal medium for stop-motion
animation, thanks to its maddening tendency, after moving it ever-so-slightly,
to move right back.
For that alone, Mr. Harryhausen has earned my eternal respect.
Ray’s last big film was the original Clash of the Titans, which came out in 1981. I remember being enthralled by the movie the
first time I saw it, probably because I was thirteen, and already a hardcore Greek
mythology geek from way back in second or third grade. It certainly captured my imagination enough
to inspire many swimming pool battles with the Kraken, the film’s titanic sea
monster, in our family’s above-ground pool, using a weed spear from the garage
as a weapon. I must have put a hundred razor-thin
slits in the blue vinyl liner as I launched it through the water, admiring as
it cut like a self-propelled torpedo towards the far side of the pool, or repeatedly
plunging the wicked, v-shaped blade like a harpoon down through the bottom and
into the satisfyingly dense, hard-packed sand beneath.
Of course, I was sensible enough to remain silent whenever
my dad would bring up the subject of how the pool always seemed to be
leaking. And I tried not to lollygag
when I would see my dad out there, paddling around in frustration with a mask
on and holding a patch kit in one hand, looking for holes.
Sorry, dad.
The point is, even as smitten as I was with Clash of the Titans, I had to
acknowledge many of the effects in the film weren’t as realistic as I wanted
them to be. I remember cringing a little
at some of the clunkier moments, and I’m not even referring to Harry Hamlin’s
performance. Some things worked (the
transformation of Calibos, for instance, or the severed head of Hera’s colossal
statue snapping her eyes open, and the Kraken itself come to mind). Some things, though, just weren’t very
convincing. Even with all of
Harryhausen’s enormous prowess applied to the task, the hideous Medusa never
felt real (especially the snakes), Muppets moved more naturally than the
animated monsters, and flying Pegasus mostly looked like a white horse with
cartoon wings. I was just so eager to
see a movie – not a cartoon, a real movie – about Greek mythology that I simply
refused to allow those buzzkill moments to derail my enjoyment of the
film.
It’s amazing sometimes the obstacles a fevered imagination
can overcome.
Harryhausen's work often looks its best in still photos. Makes sense, since he was making it one frame at a time. |
Ray did it as well as it could be done. And that, under the circumstances, is high
praise. Further, it would be wrong to
imply that his effects weren’t effective within their own time and place. Ray’s work didn’t thwart the audience’s capacity
for wonder; it fueled it. Our
imaginations were not repelled or retarded when watching his movies, they were
augmented and excited. Even if the
results weren’t always believable, they were better than anything else we had
seen to that point, and more than enough to unleash great driving inspirations
of their own. His work spawned
subsequent generations of artists and filmmakers who would seek out new ways of
realistically portraying creatures onscreen.
The movie industry would spend many years, and many millions (more
likely billions) of dollars, to invent, develop and refine entirely new
technologies, all in a concentrated effort to overcome “the Harryhausen
effect.”
In short, his work kept a whole lot of other people dreaming,
me included.
Thanks especially for that, Mr. Harryhausen.
P.S. If you want to read a very different take on Harryhausen from someone I would describe as a true fan, check out this post by M.V. Moorhead. He's a Phoenix writer who's got a well-written and frequently insightful blog that I really enjoy.
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