While the animation crew performed miracles in London, a mixture of animators from Richard Williams’ studio and Disney, back in Burbank Disney crammed Toon Town with every iconic Disney and Warner Bros. Fortunately, they had the first silent VistaVision cameras at their disposal (if belatedly) and they utilized every trick available, including puppetry as stand-ins.They even had mime consultants to enhance the believability of Hoskins grabbing Roger. They broke all the rules and got away with murder - this was no “Mary Poppins” or “Pete’s Dragon”: it was a revolutionary hybrid in which they somehow forced the animation and effects from ILM to seamlessly co-exist with the live-action.The camera wasn’t locked down and so they were forced to animated on 1s and it was a compositing nightmare. Remember, this was pre-digital and before CG. It was always “Chinatown” meets Tex Avery and the two biggest laughs are still Jessica Rabbit’s zinger, “I’m not bad - I’m just drawn that way,” and Bob Hoskins’ remark about not needing a car in LA when you’ve got public transportation.īut the informative Q&A afterward (hosted fittingly enough by “Wreck-It Ralph”director Rich Moore) reaffirmed what an amazing experiment “Roger Rabbit” was. It might’ve been exhausting for director Zemeckis to revisit “Roger Rabbit” on the big screen, but for the rest of us the wild ride through LA and Toon Town again circa 1947 was zany fun and pure joy. Indeed, the project was in development hell until the Michael Eisner/Jeffrey Katzenberg regime came to Disney to shake things up with the help of exec producer Steven Spielberg and director Bob Zemeckis, fresh from “Back to the Future.”Īnd Thursday night’s love fest at the Academy (featuring a dazzling digital presentation, which is also available on a new must-own Blu-ray/DVD combo set from Disney) merely reinforced a hunger for the return of 2D. It paved the way for the second Disney renaissance, launched a year later with “The Little Mermaid, “proving that ‘toons could be hip again theatrically, that they weren’t just for kids,and that hand-drawn 2D could hold its own dramatically - and culturally - with live-action. After 25 years, “ Who Framed Roger Rabbit” still remains one of the boldest and most exciting achievements in animation history.
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