The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms

MOVIE #1,550 • 🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 • 04.17.24 Certainly a cheaper affair than any of the earlier Kong entries, and the run-time is padded with extraneous dialogue and exposition (and stock footage of a shark battling an octopus). But it's nevertheless a fascinating film in terms of serving, at least partially, as the inspiration for Honda’s Godzilla (a giant monster awakened/brought about by an atomic bomb detonation… obviously the extent of this and/or it being a total coincidence is disputed). Visually, much of the last twenty minutes delivers as well, with the fantastic Ray Harryhausen stop-motion work. And a burning amusement park is the perfect backdrop for any movie in any genre, honestly…

And I really like this line/delivery as well...

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The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms is a 1953 American science fiction action horror film directed by Eugène Lourié, with special effects by Ray Harryhausen. The film stars Paul Christian, Paula Raymond, Cecil Kellaway, and Kenneth Tobey. The screenplay is based on Ray Bradbury's 1951 short story "The Fog Horn", specifically the scene where a lighthouse is destroyed by the title character. The film is about the Rhedosaurus, a dinosaur that is released from its frozen hibernating state by an atomic bomb test in the Arctic Circle and begins to wreak a path of destruction as it travels southward, eventually arriving at its ancient spawning grounds, which includes New York City. It was released on June 13, 1953.