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Who Framed Roger Rabbit poster

Who Framed Roger Rabbit

1988 ¡ 104 min ¡ movie
⭐ 7.7 (233,185 votes)

In 1947 Los Angeles, animated cartoon characters, or "toons", co-exist with humans. Private detective Eddie Valiant, once a staunch ally of the toons, has become a depressed alcoholic following his brother Teddy's murder by an unknown toon five years prior. Maroon Cartoon Studios owner R.K. Maroon, upset about the recent poor performance of his toon star Roger Rabbit, hires Eddie to investigate rumors that Roger's glamorous toon wife, Jessica, is having an affair with Marvin Acme, owner of the Acme Corporation and Toontown, the animated metropolis in which toons reside.

After watching Jessica perform at The Ink and Paint Club, Eddie secretly photographs her and Acme playing patty-cake. He shows the pictures to Roger, who becomes distraught, refusing to believe Jessica was unfaithful. The next morning, Acme is found murdered, and evidence implicates Roger. At the crime scene, Eddie meets Judge Doom, the sinister human judge of Toontown—having bribed the electorate for their votes—and his five weasel minions, the Toon Patrol. Doom reveals that he will execute Roger using the "dip", a chemical concoction of acetone, benzene, and turpentine, which can destroy the otherwise invulnerable toons.

Roger's toon co-star, Baby Herman, believes Roger is innocent and suggests to Eddie that Acme's missing will, which supposedly bequeaths Toontown to the toons, may have been the killer's true motive. Eddie returns to his office and finds Roger hiding there, insisting that he has been framed. Eddie agrees to help after finding evidence of Acme's will; he hides Roger in a bar tended by his girlfriend, Dolores. Later, Jessica tells Eddie that Maroon threatened Roger's career unless she posed for the compromising photos. Meanwhile, Dolores uncovers that Cloverleaf Industries recently bought the city's Pacific Electric railway system and will purchase Toontown at midnight unless Acme's will is found. Doom and the Toon Patrol find Roger, but he and Eddie escape with help from Benny, a toon taxi cab. Sheltering in a movie theater, Eddie sees a newsreel of Maroon selling his studio to Cloverleaf.

While Eddie goes to the studio to interrogate Maroon, Jessica abducts Roger. Maroon denies involvement in Acme's murder, admitting he intended to blackmail Acme into selling his company, as otherwise Cloverleaf would not buy the studio. In the middle of his confession, Maroon is assassinated, and Eddie spots Jessica fleeing. Assuming she is the assailant, he reluctantly follows her into Toontown after throwing away his remaining alcohol. After saving Eddie from being shot by Doom, Jessica reveals that her actions were to ensure Roger's safety, and it was Doom who killed Acme and Maroon. Acme gave his will to Jessica for safety. When she examined it, the paper was blank.

Doom and the Toon Patrol capture Jessica and Eddie, bringing them to Acme's factory. Doom reveals that he is the sole shareholder of Cloverleaf. He plans to erase Toontown with a dip-spraying machine so he can build a freeway in its place and decommission the railway system to force people to use it. When Roger fails to save Jessica, the couple is tied to a hook in front of the machine's sprayer. Eddie performs a series of pratfalls that cause the weasels to laugh themselves to death, kicks their leader into the dip, and then fights Doom. After being flattened by a steamroller, Doom reveals himself as a disguised toon and Teddy's murderer. Struggling against Doom's toon abilities, Eddie empties the machine's dip supply, spraying and killing Doom. The machine crashes through the wall into Toontown, where it is destroyed by a train.

As police and toons gather at the scene, Eddie realizes that Acme's will was written on the "blank" paper in temporarily invisible ink, confirming that the toons inherit Toontown. Having regained his sense of humor, Eddie happily enters Toontown alongside Dolores, Roger, Jessica, and the toons.

Directed by

Robert Zemeckis

Starring