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PlotSpoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.
The movie opens as a Baby Herman short subject, which in the realm of this film is revealed to be a "live action" slapstick short in the midst of production. This introduces the film's title character, who plays the supporting comic foil to infant cartoon star (actually a grown man who appears to be a baby) Baby Herman. In the movie's milieu, cartoon characters are a cohabiting sapient species alongside human beings, though unlike them, are unbounded by the laws of physics -- but only when it's funny. Eventually, it is revealed that Marvin Acme, the owner of the Acme Company and of Toontown, has been murdered. All signs point to Roger Rabbit, a Toon star at Maroon Cartoons, who had recently been shown evidence that Acme and Roger's wife, Jessica Rabbit, a sexy Toon femme fatale (uncredited speaking voice by Kathleen Turner, singing voice by Amy Irving), had been playing pattycake together (literally) — this is tantamount to infidelity in the eyes of a Toon. Image:Roger Rabbit.png Roger Rabbit, from the opening scene
Meanwhile, Doom's giant Cloverleaf Corporation is plotting to buy out the interurban railway, the Pacific Electric, nicknamed "the red car," and replace it with freeways (based on the General Motors streetcar conspiracy and National City Lines, the effort to replace trolleys with buses across the country). With Acme dead and no will having been found, Toontown is in danger of being bulldozed in order to make way for the freeway. Eddie and Roger must find the will of the late Marvin Acme, which purportedly gives ownership of Toontown to the Toons, as per Acme’s solemn oath. Judge Doom is also trying to find the will in order to dispose of it, so he can destroy Toontown and build his freeway where the place once stood, making himself a profit out of the deal. If any Toons happen to get in his way, Judge Doom feels no qualms about subjecting them to the "Dip": a mixture he’s concocted of acetone, benzene, and turpentine; essentially paint thinner, and the only sure way to permanently kill a Toon. Eddie goes to the studios of Maroon Cartoons, Roger's employer, to help clear the rabbit's name. There he interrogates R. K. Maroon, who is shot twice in the back and is killed. Thinking the shooter to be Jessica Rabbit, playing Roger for a patsy, Eddie chases the assassin all the way into Toontown, despite his trepidation; Eddie has not set foot in Toontown since brother Teddy’s demise. There Eddie discovers that the assassin was actually Judge Doom, who also murdered Marvin Acme. Doom manages to kidnap Jessica, and later Roger, so he can "dip" them.
Just when it seems that Judge Doom is about to win, Eddie uses an Acme scissor-spring-loaded punch-glove mallet to knock open the drain valve on the "dip" machine, drenching Judge Doom and draining the Dip out of the machine, saving Roger and Jessica. Doom melts away, but the "dip" machine breaks through the wall, and enters Toontown. Fortunately, it is plowed into by a passenger train almost instantly. Eddie then washes the Dip from the factory floor using the factory's hydrant system, and frees Jessica and Roger. The police soon arrive, and realize that Judge Doom was responsible for the murders of Maroon, Acme, and Teddy Valiant, though no one knows for sure who he was. Marvin Acme's will is found (Acme wrote it in "disappearing re-appearing ink", and Roger used the "blank" paper to write Jessica a love letter), and Toontown is handed over to the control of the Toons, who all cheer and sing a chorus of "Smile, Darn Ya, Smile." BackgroundThe live-action sequences were directed by Robert Zemeckis and mostly filmed at Cannon Elstree film studios in Hertfordshire, England. Though Disney was the studio behind the film, the animated sequences were mostly done in London due to the fact that Richard Williams refused to work in Los Angeles.[1] The film stars Bob Hoskins, Christopher Lloyd, Joanna Cassidy and the voice of Charles Fleischer. The screenplay was adapted by screenwriters Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman from the 1981 novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit? by Gary K. Wolf, and the music was composed by perennial Zemeckis film composer Alan Silvestri and performed by the London Symphony Orchestra. The lack of question mark in the title is allegedly due to a superstition that films with a question mark in the title do badly at the box office. The plot of the film is derived from the infamous General Motors streetcar conspiracy, in which General Motors, Standard Oil and Firestone Tires allegedly formed the National City Lines holding company that bought out and deliberately destroyed the Los Angeles Red Car trolley system in the 1940s and 1950s. (Similarly, the Key System trolley cars in the San Francisco Bay Area suffered the same fate.) In the film, the real-life role of NCL is filled by the fictional "Cloverleaf Industries," owned solely by Judge Doom. The movie references a lot of then-current prices, like a US$25,000 over-budgeted Baby Herman cartoon and a payment of US$100 for a P.I. hire, that demonstrate the inflation in U.S. since 1947. Much of the cinematography and several scenes of the film are a homage to Roman Polanski's Chinatown. Probably one of the most obvious references is the scene in which Roger is shown the pictures of his wife cheating on him, which is very similar to the opening scene in Polanski's film. Also the character of J.J. Gittes in Chinatown is much like Eddie Valiant in that they are both private detectives. Both plots involve a corrupt establishment and a femme fatale whose intentions are at first unclear to the protagonist and viewer. As many as 100 separate pieces of film were optically combined to incorporate the animated and live-action elements. The animated characters themselves were hand-drawn without computer animation; analogue optical effects were used for adding shadows and lighting to the Toons to give them a more "realistic," three-dimensional appearance. Since the animated Roger was added in post-production, Bob Hoskins was effectively acting against empty air during the shooting of his many scenes with Roger. (However, in one part, Hoskins momentarily directed his gaze at a 6-foot rabbit. To fix this error, the animators had Roger standing on the tips of his feet, thus eliminating any illusion; no one even questioned it.) In order to facilitate Hoskins' performance, a live human in a bunny suit stood in for Roger in some scenes. A slightly earlier draft of the screenplay revealed Judge Doom also to be the hunter who mortally shot Bambi's mother, thus providing more insight into his dark nature toward his fellow Toons. However, Disney allegedly nixed the idea, most likely believing the idea to be overkill and not wanting to scare younger audiences with the character more than necessary.[2] In the graphic novel Roger Rabbit: The Resurrection of Doom, it is revealed that Doom's real name was Baron von Rotten, and that he played villains in old cartoons, until one day, he was knocked unconscious and woke up thinking he was a real villain. The film's credits run for nearly ten minutes. At the time of its release, Roger Rabbit held the record for having the longest end credits sequence in cinema history. Critical reactionAlthough test screenings proved disastrous, Roger Rabbit opened to generally positive reviews on June 21 1988. Both Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert included the film on their lists of ten favorite films of 1988, with Ebert calling it "sheer, enchanted entertainment from the first frame to the last - a joyous, giddy, goofy celebration" [1]. Rotten Tomatoes lists Who Framed Roger Rabbit as being #47 on its Best Of Rotten Tomatoes [2] all-time list with 100% positive reviews. As the website was created in 1995, and would only have the option of searching past archives, it is not able to give an accurate contemporary depiction of the review success. The movie won four Academy Awards: Best Effects, Sound Effects Editing; Best Effects, Visual Effects; Best Film Editing; and a Special Award for Richard Williams for "animation direction and creation of the cartoon characters". The film received three further nominations: Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Cinematography and Best Sound. Jessica Rabbit's look was designed after Veronica Lake. Jessica even sports Lake's trademark "Peek-a-Boo" hairstyle. The film was disliked by Chuck Jones, the famed animation director best known for his work at Warner Bros. Jones himself storyboarded the piano duel between Donald and Daffy Duck, but he felt that the version of the scene in the final film was horrible. Jones also felt that Richard Williams had become too subservient to Robert Zemeckis. It was the most successful film at the American box office during calendar year 1988, but only the second most successful film released that year, behind Rain Man, which was released in mid-December. LegacyWho Framed Roger Rabbit is seen as a landmark film that sparked the most recent era in American animation. The field of animation had suffered a recession during the 1970s and 1980s, to the point where even giants in the field such as The Walt Disney Company were considering giving up on major animated productions. By the time the 1970s ended and the 1980s began, many filmgoers were now wanting to see more R-rated, raunchy, adult-oriented films. This expensive film (production cost of $70 million - a staggering amount for the time) was a major risk for the company, but one that paid off handsomely. It inspired other studios to dive back into the field of animation; it also made animation acceptable with the movie-going public. After Roger Rabbit, interest in the history of animation exploded, and such legends in the field as Tex Avery, Chuck Jones, and Ralph Bakshi were seen in a new light and received credit and acclaim from audiences worldwide. It also provided the impetus for Disney and Warner Brothers' later animated television shows such as Darkwing Duck, Duck Tales, Animaniacs and Tiny Toon Adventures. The film featured the last major voice role for two legendary cartoon voice artists: Mel Blanc (voicing Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny, Tweety Bird and also Sylvester in a one-line cameo) and Mae Questel (voicing Betty Boop, but not Olive Oyl, who did not appear in the film). Blanc (who would shortly pass away at the age of 81) did not do Yosemite Sam's voice in the movie, done instead by Joe Alaskey. (Blanc had admitted that in his later years he was no longer able to do the "yelling" voices such as Sam's, which were very rough on his vocal chords in old age. There was a Foghorn Leghorn scene recorded but cut which also utilised Alaskey for the same reason.) Blanc also does Porky Pig, who gets the last line of the film, dressed as a police officer. The film was also the next-to-last screen appearance for veteran actors Alan Tilvern, who portrays R.K. Maroon in the film, and Stubby Kaye, who plays Marvin Acme. Tilvern appeared in only one other production before his retirement, the 1993 television version of Porgy and Bess, in which he played the non-singing role of the Detective. Alan Tilvern died in 2003. Stubby Kaye, best known for playing Nicely Nicely Johnson in the original stage and screen versions of Guys and Dolls, died in 1996. Despite being produced by Disney (in association with Steven Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment), Roger Rabbit also marked the first (and to date, only) time that characters from several animation studios (including Universal, Walter Lantz Studios, Paramount Pictures, Fleischer Studios, MGM (though the characters are owned by Turner Entertainment since 1986), Republic and Warner Bros.) appeared in one film. This allowed the first-ever meetings between Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse. A contract was signed between Disney and Warner stating that their respective icons, Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny, would each receive exactly the same amount of screen time. This is why the script has Bugs, Mickey, and Eddie together in one scene falling from a skyscraper.(However Bug Bunney can be seen for a second in the studio lot near the beginning of the film, and so it would seem that Bugs Bunny is in the movie for longer.) Also the speakeasy scene features the first and only meeting of Daffy Duck and Donald Duck performing a unique dueling piano act. Finally the unique pairing is given a final send off at the end of the film when Porky Pig faces the audience and says the traditional Warner Brothers animation closing line, "That's all, Folks!" just before Tinkerbell appears to tap the scene in the traditional Disney ending manner. Eventually, several additional animated shorts featuring Roger Rabbit, Jessica Rabbit, and Baby Herman would be released. These shorts were presented in front of various Touchstone/Disney features in an attempt to revive short subject animation as a part of the movie-going experience. These shorts include Tummy Trouble released in front of the blockbuster Honey, I Shrunk The Kids (this was included on the original video release of the film), Roller Coaster Rabbit shown in front of the hit Dick Tracy and Trail Mix-Up shown in front of the soon forgotten A Far Off Place. They were all released on video in 1996 on a tape called The Best of Roger Rabbit, and in 2003 on a special edition DVD of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Tummy Trouble was produced at the main Walt Disney Feature Animation studio in Burbank, California, while Roller Coaster Rabbit and Trail Mix-Up were produced at the satellite studio located at Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando, Florida. In 1989, Marvel Comics commissioned a special graphic novel as a novelization in comic-book form. The novel featured several ideas for the plot scrapped from the original film, such as Roger and Eddy actually making a getaway in Dooms' squad car (until the engine blows up after Roger constantly hammers the pedals), as well as the deleted Pighead sequence featured on the Laserdisc version of the DVD releases. Today, these Graphic novels are collectors' items due to their rarity. In 1991, the Disney Imagineers began to develop a new land for the Disneyland theme park in Anaheim, California, completely based on the Toontown of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Mickey's Toontown opened in 1993 and spawned "Toontown" (without the Mickey's prefix) at Tokyo Disneyland in Japan. The Californian and Japanese Toontowns feature a ride based on Roger Rabbit's adventures, called Roger Rabbit's Car Toon Spin. The film was referenced in the 2000 film, The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, which has some elements similar to Roger Rabbit. Controversies, Easter eggs and deleted sectionsImage:Jessica Rabbit crotch.jpg Original frame showing up Jessica's dress Image:Jessica Rabbit crotch reissue.png Retouched frame from the DVD reissue Several Easter eggs were hidden in the film by its animators. Tape-based analog video such as VHS did not reveal these, but technologies with better image quality, such as the laserdisc, were said to reveal, amongst others, the phone number of then Disney CEO Michael Eisner. Also, when Benny the Cab wrecks at night and Eddie and Jessica roll out, there are two separate frames (2170-2172 on side 4 of the laserdisc version), within two seconds of each other, showing a blurry shot of her crotch. Disney recalled the laserdisc and issued another disc, later claiming that it was an incorrectly painted cel. Disney also stated that the cel in question could be seen on the new disc and on the VHS version. A brief scene consisting of the toon Baby Herman giving a sexual gesture to a female (human) extra on the set of the opening cartoon was edited out of the first DVD edition of the movie, though it can be found on editions of the VHS, laserdisc, and DVD issues. Gary Wolf, author of the original novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit?, corresponded with many fans of the film through written letters and the Internet, compiling an exhaustive listing of the many hidden "easter eggs" in the film and in the later Roger Rabbit short films. Wolf also sued Disney in 2001 for unpaid earnings related to the film. In the piano duel scene with Donald Duck and Daffy Duck, Daffy says "I've worked with a lot of wise-quackers, but you are despicable." and Donald supposedly replies, in his kazoo-like voice "God damn stupid nigger...." Snopes, a noted debunking website, debunks this with the closed-captioning which records Donald as saying "Goddurn stubborn nitwit," though Snopes actually believes he's saying something akin to his typical exclamation, "Doggone stubborn little...That did it...waaagh!" as is heard in many old Disney cartoons. [3] AnachronismsRoger Rabbit takes place in Hollywood in 1947. With this in mind, several anachronistic errors are easily spotted. For instance the model sheets used for many of the characters in it, especially the Warner Bros. stars, who were on paid license from Warner Bros., were typically older ones that were not actually in use at the time (Bugs Bunny, noticeably, used an early sheet that was phased out of use at Warner Bros./Leon Schlesinger Pictures in 1943). Also, several characters who were created after 1947 were included at the behest of the film crew; for example, the Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote appear because they are Robert Zemeckis' favorite cartoon characters. The appearance of post-1947 Toons can be explained by the idea that in the universe of the film, Toons are sentient beings who exist independent of humans and that certain Toons were around but hadn't started working in films yet. There are some anachronisms in the film that aren't so easily explained by Roger Rabbit’s premise. In the scene where Judge Doom comes to the bar looking for Roger, Angelo speaks up when he hears that there is a reward for the rabbit. He says: "Yeah, I've seen a rabbit", then he turns around and addresses thin air: "Say hello, Harvey." Many believe this is a reference to the James Stewart movie Harvey (in which the title character is a six-foot-tall talking rabbit seen only by the protagonist) and perceive it as an error, because the movie came out in 1950 and Roger Rabbit takes place in 1947. However the stage version of Harvey came out on Broadway in 1944, to which, logically, Angelo could be referring. Also, it is possible that the character himself is not intentionally or directly referencing the movie nor theatre production, and merely gives his 'rabbit' the name 'Harvey', thus enabling the filmmakers to reference the movie regardless of when it was released. An error that could not be justified is the cartoon that plays in the theater where Eddie and Roger hide out: Goofy Gymnastics, a Goofy cartoon from 1949. In Roger Rabbit DVD special commentary, they explain the justification for the cartoon. When the movie was made, the film makers used Goofy Gymnastics because they considered it to be the most violent and comical cartoon Disney had made to that date. The "freeway" that Judge Doom wanted to build directly through ToonTown is described as running from "from here to Pasadena". It is very likely that this is the Pasadena Freeway (now California State Route 110) running from downtown Los Angeles, but possibly (and much more unlikely) the Ventura Freeway (California State Route 134/Interstate 210), running from near Burbank and along the northern part of the Los Angeles Basin. The problem here is that the Pasadena Freeway was completed in 1940, so this would be an error on Valiant's part for being surprised about a "freeway". The song the Singing Sword sings is "Witchcraft" (written by Cy Coleman and Carolyn Leigh, and sung by Frank Sinatra). The song was not written until 1957. The Singing Sword was first seen in the Bugs Bunny cartoon Knighty Knight Bugs, released in 1958. There is a question about Betty Boop being a black and white "Toon", she makes the remark to Eddie Valiant that things have been tough since everything went to color, but it was the development of colored film that had changed. One would think that "Toons" would still have always been in color but only filmed with the black and white film that was being used at that time. So the idea is that Betty Boop should have always been a colored "toon", with only her movies filmed in black and white, Betty Boop did appear in color in 1934's "Poor Cinderella". One example is Mickey Mouse, who was also a black and white cartoon when he first appeared on film in "Plane Crazy" in 1928, but is seen as a colored "Toon" at the end of this film. Finally, at the end of the film Porky Pig casually claims to spontaneously come up with his famous stuttering "That's all folks!" line and, decides to conclude the film with it. However, nearly all Looney Tunes cartoons ending with Porky saying that line were made before 1946. Regarding the errors, writer Peter Seaman said that the aim of the film was "entertainment, not animation history" which explains why these anachronisms were overlooked. Spoilers end here.
Animated charactersMain cartoon charactersThese characters were all created for and made their first appearances in the film. Cartoon characters that make cameo appearancesThese characters had all appeared in either film or cartoon shorts made by various studios. Disney
Warner Bros.
MGM
Paramount Pictures/Fleischer StudiosWalter Lantz
(*) Denotes anachronisms; these characters (or, in the cases of characters such as Tinkerbell, the animated versions of them that appear in the film) were created after 1947. Academy AwardsWinner of 4 Oscars:
3 additional nominations:
CastHuman actors
Toon voice actorsMerchandisingThe success of Who Framed Roger Rabbit lead to a moderate degree of merchandising for the film. In October 1989, McDonald's made a Halloween themed certificate offer for a free VHS copy of the film as well as a Roger Rabbit doll. Other memorabilia included cookie jars, Christmas ornaments, music boxes, snow globes, pinback buttons, a videogame, and a novelization of the film. While much of the merchandise was produced throughout the 1988-'89 promotion of the film, other items would later be offered as commemorative collectibles in celebration of Disney-related anniversaries. References and footnotes
See also
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