B+ | A toon and a human must work together to solve a murder. Directed by Robert Zemeckis Starring Bob Hoskins and Charles Fleischer Review by Jon Kissel |
With films like The Polar Express and Welcome to Marwen, Robert Zemeckis has spent most of the last twenty years trying to work out the kinks in CGI filmmaking. This quixotic pursuit is made all the more useless thanks to Zemeckis’ mastery of the old-fashioned animation style in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Who needs ones and zeroes when you’ve got a game Bob Hoskins? Blending real actors and sets with animated characters, and vice versa, Who Framed Roger Rabbit still impresses by being committed, even when the effects aren’t quite seamless. Zemeckis has made a fool of himself for much of the 21st century, but in the 80’s and 90’s, the crowd-pleaser king sat on a throne of Deloreans and Acme hammers.
Uniting the houses of Disney and Warner Bros, Who Framed Roger Rabbit has access to sixty years of animated characters, but the Mickey’s and Daffy’s of the world do background work for Roger Rabbit (Charles Fleischer). The post-war Hollywood that Roger works in has toons like him in front of the camera, serving as comedic icons who churn out content while living alongside humans. Roger’s comedy of errors-type show is falling behind thanks to his lackluster performances, believed to be brought on by his tumultuous marriage to bombshell Jessica (Kathleen Turner). Private eye Eddie Valiant (Hoskins) is brought on to prove to Roger that Jessica’s cheating on him, and after he provides the evidence to Roger, the industrialist that was with Jessica turns up dead. Roger’s the number one suspect, pursued by Judge Doom (Christopher Lloyd) for instant execution, but the toon-hating Eddie takes pity on Roger and works to hide him from Doom and clear his name.
I knew Who Framed Roger Rabbit was going to be a detective noir parody, and it does all those tropes well. Jessica’s slinky and seductive as any mid-century moll must be, and Hoskins is perfectly cast as a barrel-chested tough guy who’s softer than he looks. What I didn’t expect was a child-sized intro into neoliberalism. This film is far smarter than it needed to be. The overarching plot has Doom inventing the suburbs. He buys a successful public transit interest so he can destroy it, and instead force everyone to use his freeway which will need to run directly through Toontown. An egalitarian public good is replaced by a system that enforces consumerism, and a unique place with character is replaced by uniformity and disposability. Swap out the toons for an underrepresented minority and that’s the story of 20th century urban development and white flight. Writers Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman were inspired by Chinatown, and while Who Framed Roger Rabbit doesn’t have any incest or nose-slicing, the two films strangely have far more in common than I could’ve ever expected.
As the guide through Roger Rabbit’s hybrid world, Hoskins is an incredible sport. He’s Jim Carrey without the rubber face, open to anything that’s asked of him except trimming his back and shoulders. Want him to give a heartfelt monologue about the time his brother was killed by a falling piano? How about a vaudevillian song and dance routine? Demonstrate arousal as a result of a cartoon nightclub act? Hoskins fell on my radar late in his career with his role as Khrushchev in Enemy at the Gates, so his commitment to pure silliness here is a total surprise and a gift, as is the film that contains it. Who Framed Roger Rabbit surprises and impresses and entertains, another in a string of hits for Zemeckis. He’d be one of the great pop directors if not a half dozen or more of his recent efforts that are otherwise worthy of the Dip. B+
I knew Who Framed Roger Rabbit was going to be a detective noir parody, and it does all those tropes well. Jessica’s slinky and seductive as any mid-century moll must be, and Hoskins is perfectly cast as a barrel-chested tough guy who’s softer than he looks. What I didn’t expect was a child-sized intro into neoliberalism. This film is far smarter than it needed to be. The overarching plot has Doom inventing the suburbs. He buys a successful public transit interest so he can destroy it, and instead force everyone to use his freeway which will need to run directly through Toontown. An egalitarian public good is replaced by a system that enforces consumerism, and a unique place with character is replaced by uniformity and disposability. Swap out the toons for an underrepresented minority and that’s the story of 20th century urban development and white flight. Writers Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman were inspired by Chinatown, and while Who Framed Roger Rabbit doesn’t have any incest or nose-slicing, the two films strangely have far more in common than I could’ve ever expected.
As the guide through Roger Rabbit’s hybrid world, Hoskins is an incredible sport. He’s Jim Carrey without the rubber face, open to anything that’s asked of him except trimming his back and shoulders. Want him to give a heartfelt monologue about the time his brother was killed by a falling piano? How about a vaudevillian song and dance routine? Demonstrate arousal as a result of a cartoon nightclub act? Hoskins fell on my radar late in his career with his role as Khrushchev in Enemy at the Gates, so his commitment to pure silliness here is a total surprise and a gift, as is the film that contains it. Who Framed Roger Rabbit surprises and impresses and entertains, another in a string of hits for Zemeckis. He’d be one of the great pop directors if not a half dozen or more of his recent efforts that are otherwise worthy of the Dip. B+
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