Harryhausen’s is the restaurant where Mike and Celia celebrate in Pixar’s Monsters, Inc.
Mike Wazowski takes his girlfriend and workplace receptionist, Celia Mae, to Harryhausen’s for her birthday. The evening becomes a major turning point when Boo is accidentally brought into the restaurant. Because human children are considered dangerous contaminants by monster society, the Child Detection Agency quickly quarantines the establishment.
The restaurant scene helps show how strongly monsters fear contact with the human world. It also introduces the film’s memorable contamination panic, including the removal of objects that may have touched Boo. Mike and Celia’s date is therefore more than a brief romantic subplot: it directly connects the characters’ private lives with the film’s central conflict.
Harryhausen’s is sometimes remembered simply as “the sushi restaurant,” but that description is not its proper name. The name is a playful reference to Ray Harryhausen, the influential stop-motion animator and visual-effects artist.