Harryhausen's (pronounced hair-ree-how-zinz) is a Japanese restaurant in Monstropolis in the 2001 Disney/Pixar animated film Monsters, Inc. Difficult to get a reservation at, it is where Mike Wazowski takes Celia out to for a date on her birthday.
Role in the film
Harryhausen's is the restaurant that Mike Wazowski takes his girlfriend Celia Mae to for her birthday dinner in Monsters, Inc.. The greeting when visitors arrive is: "Get a paper bag!"
During Mike's dinner with Celia, Sulley shows up to tell Mike about Boo, the human girl who somehow got into the monster world. However, she breaks away from Sulley and makes her presence known to all the patrons, causing mass panic in the restaurant. The Sushi Chief calls the CDA for help, and they arrive at the restaurant and round up everybody inside for decontamination. Mike and Sulley manage to escape with Boo, but Celia is caught. The entire restaurant is then closed off from the city in a blue force field. It was after the incident in the restaurant that all of Monstropolis became aware of Boo's presence in the monster world.
The restaurant scene is also featured in Mike's company play Put That Thing Back Where It Came From Or So Help Me, where Mr. Bile participates as the Sushi Chef in this play.
Gallery
Trivia
- The restaurant is named after the famous stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen. Such noticeable examples of Harryhausen's work include films like The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958), Jason and the Argonauts (1963), The Valley of Gwangi (1969), The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973), and Clash of the Titans (1981).
- The Sushi Chef who runs the restaurant is also based on the octopus from It Came from Beneath the Sea, another film that Harryhausen worked on.
- In both the storybook version and storyboards of Monsters, Inc., the CDA blew up the restaurant, but because of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, it was changed to the restaurant being quarantined under a force field in the finalized version of the film to avoid reminding viewers, or to show respect to the victims.
- Marlin from the next film Finding Nemo is shown on the wall behind the Sushi Chef in the restaurant. On an interesting note, Finding Nemo was released just a year and a half later.
- A billboard of the restaurant makes a cameo in Cars 2.
- The overall design of the restaurant resembles a Japanese sushi restaurant.
- The restaurant also made a brief cameo in the short Tokyo Mater, complete with car-ified versions of Mike and Sulley that appeared earlier in a Cars version of Monsters, Inc. (Monster Trucks, Inc.) that was among the Cars versions of other Pixar films shown during the credits of Cars.
- The fact that the monster employees yell, "Get a paper bag!" whenever someone enters the restaurant may be a reference to the fact that Japanese employees at restaurants and other stores yell, "Irasshaimase!" whenever someone enters. A similar Japanese saying and interpretation shows up in Toy Story 2 when Al, while talking with Mr. Koneishi, says "Don't Touch My Moustache", a mnemonic of the Japanese term for You're Welcome.
- In the Monsters at Work pilot episode Welcome to Monsters, Incorporated, Mike mentions that he and Sulley got banned from Harryhausen's for life because of Boo. However, by the fourth episode, The Big Wazowskis, Mike mentions that thanks to his and Sulley's promotion, their ban from Harryhausen's has been lifted. This is proven at the end of the episode when Mike has to take his bowling rival Gary Gibbs to the restaurant after both of their bowling teams tied (the grand prize was a dinner for two at Harryhausen's).
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