WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT

This film made a name for itself for being a quantum leap forward technically in how it seamlessly combines real action with animation, and it's a testament to the care and expertise deployed that some 30-odd years later its visuals still hold up.

On this second watch I was well entertained throughout - who wouldn't be?  To take one example, the newspaper headline relating to the kidnapping of Donald Duck's nephews had me hooting with laughter.

And yet, as with the first time I saw it, I was left with a feeling of dissatisfaction.  Ultimately it's a film I admire and enjoy, rather than love.

Part of my dissatisfaction stems from the story about Toon Town being at risk and how Roger Rabbit gets to be framed for a murder.  I wasn't grabbed by it, and long before the end I had lost interest in the fate of someone's last will and testament (don't ask me whose).  We don't get to spend enough time in Toon Town for me to be emotionally invested in its fate.  

Nor was I very emotionally invested in the story arc of Bod Hoskin's character such as it is, maybe because he was never an actor I warmed to.  I was expecting the death of his brother in the past to be somehow linked to the story we are watching but it isn't even though it turns out that it was Judge Doom who murdered him.  The fact that why he did this is never explained, or that we never learn anything about Judge Doom's back story is symptomatic of the story's fuzziness. 

The drawing of Jessica Rabbit is also problematic.

But perhaps the biggest problem is that the film isn't able to fulfil the promise of the brilliant opening sequence, or indeed deliver fully on the potential of the basic premise of the film, of a world in which cartoon characters coexist with humans.  

The director Robert Zemeckis had previously made a perfect film in 'Back To The Future', where the film does totally deliver, but of course it's unreasonable to expect such lightning in a bottle to happen again. 

RATING: ✓ If You've Nothing Better To Do