Animated Noir: A Review of “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”

Excerpts from the Paper

Animated Noir: A Review of "Who Framed Roger Rabbit"
Who Framed Roger Rabbit, a 1988 Robert Zemeckis
Animation/Comedy/Crime/Mystery motion picture focuses on the fringe dwellers of society, the Noir film staple rundown private detective, the requisite bad guys, and the cops. It attempts to mimic the Noir films of the late 1940’s and early 1950’s in a family oriented drama that fails on multiple levels, largely because of its hodge-podge style.
The film takes a dark view of the behind the scenes wrangling by Hollywood brokers in the 1940’s, blending humor and clever dialogue with the crime that drives the action behind the scenes. The film is largely involved in the seedy underworld of old Hollywood, yet it is painted as a form of comedy....

..... the film, I did discover some validity of what we have learned about the Urban Experience. The fact that the film uses the clichés and stereotypes that still exist in today’s world of entertainment and in today’s world of politics demonstrates clearly to me that very little has changed in the dynamics of the city. The demonstration of power brokers running the show behind the scenes of Hollywood, and the paranoia of stars resonated clearly as if they were drawn today, some twenty-one years after the film. The fact that the film was about a time over fifty years ago only entrenches this perspective.
Works Cited
Who Framed Roger Rabbit (Vista Series). Dir. Robert
Zemeckis
.
Perf
. Bob Hoskins, Christopher Lloyd. DVD. Disney Home Video, 1988.