Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) - One of the Greatest Movies Ever Made

Let's finish this Special Effects movie marathon with one of the most beloved movies of the 1980s. I'll admit, a large reason I did want to do this marathon was that it put Who Framed Roger Rabbit in my list of potential reviews, and while I was not fully set on doing it, I thought, why not? I wanted to end this marathon on a movie that I loved, especially since as of the publication of this review, my birthday is tomorrow, and it also helps that I did kind of tease this movie back when I wrote my editorial about TRON. So, why not give Who Framed Roger Rabbit a look? Besides, we also had that Chip 'N Dale movie recently, so the timing is, a little off, but still fortuitous, it really does seem like everything just kind of fell into place for me to review this movie, and really, do I even need an excuse to talk about this movie? It is legitimately one of my favourites.

Set in Hollywood in 1947, Private Eye Eddie Valiant is asked by cartoon producer R. K. Maroon to follow Jessica Rabbit, the wife of his employee Roger, and Marvin Acme, to show Roger some evidence his wife may not be best for him. The next day however, Marvin Acme is found murdered and Roger is the number one suspect and is being chased by Judge Doom and his gang of weasels. From there, a mystery is set surrounding the missing will of Marvin Acme, and the connections an upcoming company called Cloverleaf industries has with R. K. Maroon. As a mystery, on the one hand it is done really well. That being said I don't think it's really going to surprise you, but I found myself invested in where it was going, even after countless rewatches. On top of that, the plot itself is really solid, especially the way they establish things early on. For example, when looking at the scene of Acme's murder, they set up the tools that Eddie would use to fight Judge Doom at the end, and the sweeping transition shot of Eddie's desk would set up the circus tricks he would utilize to defeat the Weasels. I do think they could have established the disappearing/reappearing ink plot point a bit earlier in the story, but all in all, I definitely give the plot a solid A.

In comparison, the characters may seem a bit basic. You have Eddie who is the drunk and bitter private eye with a hard backstory, Roger is a toon who loves to entertain, and Judge Doom is the creepy villain. However, not only are the performances by Bob Hoskins, Charles Fleischer and Christopher Lloyd absolutely superb, but the way these characters are introduced is excellent. The first shot we see of Eddie, we get everything we need to know about who he is, he's a drunk, he's bitter and he doesn't like Toons, and Judge Doom's introduction, the dark figure towering over Eddie and glaring down at him, it's absolutely perfect. The characters are easily identifiable, easy to relate to, and entertaining to watch, some stories don't need much else. You could have some really deep and complex characters, but that would have taken away from the mystery, the setting and the commentary.

Oh yeah, let's talk about the commentary. Now, Who Framed Roger Rabbit was based on the book Who Censored Roger Rabbit by Gary K. Wolfe, I haven't read it but I am aware that the movie is not a true adaptation. That being said, so much about this movie ties into the racial issues of the time period. Turning Toon Town into a freeway sounds really similar to gentrification, and Roger even alludes to Toons not getting proper justice, much like Black Americans of the 40s and 50s and many will even argue today. The commentary is subtle, but it is there. This is where I feel this movie and the recent Chip 'n Dale movie differ the most. That movie, one could argue, attempted to have commentary about the nature of fandom and the treatment of child stars, but I found it to be weak. Here, you could tell me directly that this movie is an allusion to racism and I would buy it without calling any of the evidence a stretch.

Speaking of Chip 'n Dale, when I talked about that movie, I brought up that Roger Rabbit isn't really a comedy. So, how many times do I have to say "Whoops, I was wrong, my mistake" before people just forget I made the mistake? Yeah, for whatever reason I do forget how funny this movie actually is, and a lot of that is thanks to the animation. The animation director for this movie was Richard Williams and you can tell just from the opening skit, with the beautifully flowing camera work. Richard Williams was great at animating flow, whether it is the flow of a camera or the flow of a dancing ragdoll, he was just such an amazing talent. On top of that, the mixing is pretty damn near spotless. Sure there was one or two times the items did not interact quite well with the animation, but for the most part it really does look like these animated figures were actually there, live on camera. So many mechanics and doodads had to be hidden underneath very lively character animation, almost like a form of rotoscoping, and it is all just so perfect.

I mean, do I really have to explain why this is one of my favourite movies of all time? Even putting aside the investing plot, spot on performances and really good comedy, the animation and live-action mixing alone makes it enough of a mind blowing film, and then we get the different characters from different studios making appearances, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Woody Woodpecker, Droopy, heck even Felix the Cat appears as the Comedy and Tragedy masks above the Toon Town Tunnel. I mean the only thing missing is a nod to Winsor McCay, but I'll take a Coyote and Road Runner cameo instead, even if they are a bit anachronistic. It is a well made, well written, well acted, well animated, well directed and well received movie, none of you needed me to tell you to go see it, you probably already have. Legit, it is one of the greatest movies ever made, and if you're going to pass it up because "It has cartoons in it" well fine, it's your loss. I'm sure your kids will absolutely love it though. Do I even need to say it is a High Recommendation?

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) - A Modern Classic? I'd say yes!

With November comes the knowledge that Halloween is over and the winter holidays are coming. If you are American you have Thanksgiving in November, but since I'm not, I decided to look at a movie that is between the two holidays, much like the month of November. As a bonus, I've seen this movie at least a dozen times. So, let's take a look at one of the best Halloween/Christmas movies, The Nightmare Before Christmas.

After a successful Halloween, the Pumpkin King Jack wanders off feeling bored of the holiday, and finds a selection of doors, opening one of them, he finds himself transported to a different world that intrigues him, a world of bright colours and a fun atmosphere called Christmas Town. After he tries to find what made the world so appealing to him, he decides to try his own hand at the holiday and has Santa Claus kidnapped. Unbeknownst to him, Santa is sent to Oogie Boogie, a devilishly evil being that finds joy in the idea of killing the jolly man. After Jack makes a mess out of the holiday of cheer, he must rescue Santa and return things to the way they were. A part of me feels like I made the plot a bit more complex than it actually is, it really is a simple plot but it is just so solid and well paced that you kind of forget about its simplicity.

While the movie does partake in time skip montage, with one exception, there aren't really a whole lot of questions surrounding the plot. Even the subplot surrounding the other main character, Sally, is integrated well into the story, as both Jack's and Sally's stories intersect in different ways, like how she tries to warn Jack about her premonitions around his attempt at Christmas, or when she escapes her room to give Jack a gift. They're small moments, but they still bring the two stories together. As a whole, the plot is smooth as butter, and even though it does follow some familiar beats, it does some things different with them, like having the emotional low of the film not only be a song number that transitions into him feeling better, but it's having him work out these thoughts on his own. I don't think I see that very often, especially not in more recent films.

Since I brought it up, let's talk about the music. Let's start with the background music, because a lot of it is really good. Danny Elfman does a wonderful score, I don't know if it is one of my favourite scores, but it is really good. I have a copy of the soundtrack on vinyl, so I have heard a few of the backing tracks a couple times, though let's be honest here, the song tracks are the most memorable part of the movie.

I criticized the Steven Universe movie for having a song every minute or so, I think this movie is a good example of how to do something like that and make it work. While songs are pretty frequent, they are used as song numbers should be. They can showcase how the character is feeling (Jack's Lament, Sally's Song and Poor Jack), or they can be used to make some scenes more interesting (Town Meeting Song, Kidnap the Sandy Claws, and Making Christmas). Plus, the movie establishes things before the songs, so we know that Jack is not feeling very cheerful before he goes into his song. On top of that, the songs were great, "This is Halloween", "Oogie Boogie's Song" and "What's This?" are some of the favourite songs in any animated movie, I'm a sucker for this soundtrack, I not only got it on Vinyl, but I also got that "Nightmare Revisited" album, with the songs redone by bands like Marilyn Manson, Korn, and The All-American Rejects. Rise Against does a pretty good cover of "Making Christmas".

I think the other thing that makes the songs good is that the characters are really strong to. We can understand that Jack is feeling bored or lonely with Halloween, and we can relate to him wanting to recapture that joy when he first arrived in Christmas Town. Oogie Boogie is another good example, as we can pick up that his is a slimey being that takes joy in causing harm and discomfort. Side characters don't get much of the spotlight, but as this movie is only slightly over an hour long, it's understandable. This brings us to Sally, and if I am going to be honest here, Sally is one of my all time favourite characters in media. I love that she is not just a passive observer, when she overhears that Jack might be in trouble, she takes initiative and tries to rescue Santa. Even though she doesn't always succeed in her plans, the important thing is that she tried and took initiative, hands down one of my favourite characters ever.

The only thing left to discuss is the visual aspect of the film. I watched this film on Blu-Ray so, the visual detail I could see was much better than a VHS. There are so many little details in this movie you are never going to see them in one sitting. On this recent sitting, I just realized that one of the motifs on Jack's front gate is a scared cat. Other nice details are things like character movements, the splotched lighting on the Professor's brain, and environmental details like etching in the stone and bark, and textures on characters clothing. Even the pallets are great, with Christmas Town being a stark contrast to Halloween Town, and even in the character palette with Sally being more colourful than Jack, though I think Anim8ball covered that part of the film much better than I could.

As for the animation itself, while the entire film is really smooth, I can't help but notice some shortcuts that were taken, and even in the more expressive characters like Jack and Sally, I could still see some jerky moth movements, though I am not sure if that is because I've done stop motion animation myself, I am going to school for animation or because I was taking a more critical look at this movie. Anyway, the visuals of this movie are great, and unique too as Disney hasn't really done anything like this since, which is kind of a shame, but I guess it does make this movie stand on its own.

I don't think it is any stretch to say that I really love this movie. Even after having seen it a dozen times, even after looking critically at it, even after looking through the tie-in Trivial Pursuit game cards. I can't hate this movie, there is so much to talk about this movie, like did you know that the speaking voice of Jack Skellington is Chris Sarandon? Yeah, Prince Hunperdink from The Princess Bride! and there were 180 individual heads for Jack as well, and though the movie was based on a poem by Tim Burton, the only characters that were in the poem originally were Jack, Santa and Jack's Dog. I have the Trivial Pursuit tie-in game, I can keep going.

To wrap this up, I think that if you enjoy the classic holiday specials of Charlie Brown or the like, you're going to enjoy this one too. Even if not, the music, visuals and silky smooth plot make it more than a nostalgic memory. It is a legitimately good movie, and I cannot recommend it enough, it is one of my all-time favourite movies, and chances are, you already plan to watch it every October, December or both.