10 / 10
Who Framed Roger Rabbit is a miracle. I saw it when it came out and couldn’t believe what I was looking at, and it still looks better than films made thirty years later. It’s a 10.
Robert Zemeckis directed it, after Back to the Future, with Richard Williams running the animation. Disney and Amblin made it together, which is how Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny ended up in the same shot. It came out in 1988 and won four Oscars.
The Source
It’s based on Gary K. Wolf’s 1981 novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit?, a much darker book where the toons talk in speech balloons. The film kept the idea of cartoons living among people and threw out nearly everything else.
The Premise
It’s 1947 in Los Angeles, and toons are real actors who live in Toontown. Eddie Valiant is a private detective who drinks and hates toons since one dropped a piano on his brother. He’s hired to snap photos of Jessica Rabbit playing patty-cake with another man, the man turns up dead, and Roger is framed for it. Behind it all is a plot to buy up the Red Car trolley line and replace it with a freeway.
The Cast
Bob Hoskins plays Eddie, and he’s the reason it works. He spent months acting against nothing, then against a stand-in, and every look and every reaction matches a character who wasn’t there. It’s the most generous performance I can think of. Christopher Lloyd plays Judge Doom, Joanna Cassidy is Dolores, Charles Fleischer voices Roger and Kathleen Turner, uncredited, is Jessica’s speaking voice.
The Animation Achievement
The animators drew every toon by hand over live-action footage, and they made them cast shadows, bump into lamps and splash in real water. The live-action crew used puppeteered props and robot arms so the toons could hold real things. It’s why nothing looks pasted on. The film won a special Oscar for Richard Williams’ animation direction.
The Judge Doom Character
Judge Doom is one of the great screen villains, and his reveal, where the rubber eyes pop out and his voice goes up an octave, still frightens children. The Dip, the chemical that kills toons, gives the film a real sense of danger that most cartoons never have.
The Animation History Engagement
The joy of it is the guest list. Donald Duck and Daffy Duck play a piano duel. Mickey and Bugs skydive together. Betty Boop is working as a cigarette girl because the work dried up when color came in. It’s a love letter to the golden age of cartoons and a small elegy for it.
Craft Note
Craft Note
Who Framed Roger Rabbit plays a hard-boiled detective story completely straight while the world around it is a cartoon. The mystery, the corruption and Eddie’s grief all work on their own terms, so the toons can be as wild as they like.
Anchor your wildest idea in a grounded genre. The ordinary frame is what lets the strange thing land.
Is Who Framed Roger Rabbit as good as people say?
Yes, and better. It’s a 10, one of the best films of the eighties and a technical feat nobody has topped. Bob Hoskins deserved far more credit for it than he got.
Frequently Asked Questions
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