Ray Harryhausen’s Jason & the Argonauts Photograph: Everett Collection / Rex Feature
Movie, a medium of individual scenes, moments, events
Chosen by Nick Park, Oscar-winning animator and writer-director of the Wallace and Gromit films.
As a boy I was into monsters, heroes going off on adventures – and stop-motion animation. I saw trailers for this film, and it seemed to be everything I wanted. I remember being at a school fair, just before Christmas, and being desperate to get home to watch it.
The scene that stood out the most, that I found both horrifying and enthralling, was the skeleton fight at the end. The heroes are all live action and the monsters are all done with stop-frame animation. It was a terrific technical feat – I think there were eight animated skeletons or more, cut together quite seamlessly with the live action. The whole choreography of it was amazing. But the story, too, really caught my imagination. These skeletons were planted like seeds, by a wizard chap spreading dragons teeth, and then dead soldiers grow up to fight the Argonauts. So exciting.
At around the same time I saw Ray Harryhausen, the animator, explain on television how he had done the skeletons. I immediately went and built my own models with wire and foam – I think I was planning to film something with my friends, live action, cut together with a sea monster made out of a coat hanger and nylon tights.
Disney films didn’t make me want to go home and do it myself because it was shrouded in mystery and technique. But when I saw the skeletons in Harryhausen’s film I wanted immediately to do it myself, because you got a sense of how it might be done.
| Jason and the Argonauts | |
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Theatrical release poster by Howard Terpning |
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Credits
Directed by Don Chaffey
Written by Beverley Cross, Jan Read, based on The Argonautica third century BC by Apollonius Rhodius
Produced by Charles H. Schneer
Cinematography Wilkie Cooper
Edited by Maurice Rootes
Music by Bernard Herrmann
Production company: Morningside Productions
Distributed by Columbia Pictures
Release date: June 13, 1963
Running time: 104 minutes
Budget $3 million
Box office $2.1 million (rentals)
