Who Framed Roger Rabbit

Who Framed Roger Rabbit is a 1988 film directed by Robert Zemeckis, combining live-action performers with hand-drawn animated characters. Produced by Amblin Entertainment and released by Touchstone Pictures, it was inspired by Gary K. Wolf’s 1981 novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit? The screenplay, by Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman, moves the action to Los Angeles in 1947, where humans and cartoon stars coexist. Bob Hoskins plays private investigator Eddie Valiant, a former friend of Toons whose brother was killed by one. Eddie is hired by cartoon producer R. K. Maroon to investigate Jessica Rabbit, the glamorous wife of actor Roger Rabbit.

Eddie photographs Jessica playing patty-cake with Marvin Acme, owner of Toontown and the Acme Corporation. Soon afterward, Acme is murdered, Roger becomes the leading suspect, and Eddie reluctantly protects him from Judge Doom. Doom, played by Christopher Lloyd, leads the sinister Toon Patrol and possesses a weapon called “the Dip,” a mixture capable of permanently destroying animated characters. Charles Fleischer supplied Roger Rabbit’s voice, while Kathleen Turner voiced Jessica Rabbit. Joanna Cassidy played Dolores, Eddie’s girlfriend, and Stubby Kaye appeared as Marvin Acme. Fleischer also voiced Benny the Cab and several other characters.

The film’s mystery concerns Acme’s missing will, which promises Toontown to its cartoon inhabitants. Eddie and Roger discover that Doom intends to erase Toontown and build a freeway through the area, echoing Los Angeles’s real postwar freeway development. In the climax at Acme’s factory, Doom reveals that he is actually a Toon, responsible for Eddie’s brother’s death. He attempts to use a mobile Dip machine against Toontown, but Eddie defeats him by flooding the factory with water, turpentine, and acetone. Roger and Jessica then help expose Doom’s plan.

Richard Williams supervised the animation, while Industrial Light & Magic created effects that made animated figures appear to interact with physical sets, props, shadows, and actors. The production secured appearances by characters from Disney, Warner Bros., MGM, and other studios, including Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, Donald Duck, and Daffy Duck. Released on June 22, 1988, the film earned major critical and commercial success. It won Academy Awards for Film Editing, Sound Effects Editing, and Visual Effects, while Williams received a Special Achievement Award for animation direction.