The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms is one of the most iconic films from the special effects career of Ray Harryhausen.
It’s an iconic monster and pretty much epitomizes what on screen dinosaurs were and to some degree are to the general public.
The monsters Ray animated were not just special effects, they were characters.
 |
| Old friends Bradbury and Harryhausen in 2006 |
Sometimes, they were even given more personality than the film’s stars. That they were given death scenes that would make an opera tenor green with envy certainly helped.
The film also has a second Ray working on it, Ray Bradbury.
It was his short story that the title and the basic plot comes from though the producers did not know so at the time.
They forgot—and then brought him in for a rewrite where he quietly pointed that out. He didn’t make a fuss, and the movie went forward to be a sci-fi classic.
Symbolism of the Rhedosaurus
Despite being awakened from a frozen slumber, it is not a monster preaching the gloom and doom of global warming. The Rhedosaurus was awakened by an atomic blast, and was the first to have done so.
The first atomic mutant on the silver screen was the giant ants from Them!, which I already talked about in a previous article.
More than the ants, the Rhedosaurus is a massive unknown.
The trailer makes that assertion so blatant as to be almost comedic to modern eyes.
Epically mocked in this Dresden Codak strip:
That the monster is aquatic, it can act as a proper cold war menace. Lurking just below the surface, waiting to strike at any moment and becoming a unstoppable monolith of destruction when out in the open.
But the most unique symbolic aspect of the Rhedosaurus is unseen.
The beast carries a disease with it which strikes down the humans exposed to its breath and blood. Like radiation was to the audience, the threat was invisible, pervasive and struck down people with a wasting away illness almost similar to early signs of mild radiation poisoning.
In all, it’s a devious way to save money on animation and let the monster become an even greater threat.
Biology
The Rhedosaurus is not a dinosaur.
I just want to get it out there first. It doesn’t fit into any known dinosaur family. However, it does fit in with a relative of the dinosaurs: a group of archosauromorpha related to the ancestors of dinosaurs and crocodiles.
The one that came to my mind as a child looking through dinosaur books was Erythrosuchus.
Its head was large and boxy and its forelegs and back legs were almost of the right proportions, but its tail was way too short. It made sense for that animal, though, as it was a large land predator.
The Beast on the other hand is adapted for aquatic life, obviously, and has several crocodilian traits in its body.
This is not that big of a problem given its lineages. However, its leg proportions are geared more towards its intimidating humans rather than gliding through the ocean. Crocodilians are more tail based in their aquatic locomotion, where the Rhedosaurus appears to swim with its arms and tail.
Another odd feature of the Rhedosaurus is its teeth: it has fangs.
Another design feature meant to intimidate humans rather than show any biological function.
Archosaurs tend to have larger teeth in the center off their upper jaws. Canine teeth are the exclusive sign of mammals and their immediate ancestors. Convergent evolution is the only way to explain that feature.
In closing, I’ll briefly mention the size issue.
Like the ants in Them!, the Rhedosaurus faces many a problem from being so huge.
That it has lungs makes it easier, but the mass of the monster is still a problem. Thankfully, its bones are appropriately dense and thick (“8 inches thick” in the skull, which is pretty damn thick), one observer notes that it would take a 3 inch shell to penetrate its skull (and its skin later repels bazooka fire until a weak spot is pointed out. This matches up with other giant monster movies – you need to be super tough to support yourself when you’re big.
But that doesn’t excuse the posture.
The elephants and sauropod dinosaurs of the real world all have strong, straight, pillar-like legs with round foot. This is to physically support the massive weight of the animal. The Rhedosaurus not only has feet, but has a splayed posture similar to that of crocodiles. They have that stance because they aren’t that big and live mostly in the water, but at the Rhedosaurus’ massive bulk, it just means that he’s not well supported when he stands.
That said; he’s still not as obtuse in his posture as the Cloverfield horror, who looks more like he’s held up by strings than his legs.
Despite this, the Rheodsaurus went on to become an icon of giant monster movies, and went on to inspire another, world famous giant monster who was crowned their king: Godzilla.
