![]() ![]() The Toons act in movies, and some are pretty big stars. Somewhere in eastern Los Angeles (near the future site of Dodger Stadium) lies Toontown, the home of animated characters, or Toons. "Roger Rabbit" is set in Hollywood in 1947. "Of all the films I've ever done, this was the most difficult," says coproducer Robert Watts, who worked on several breakthrough special effects movies, including "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "Star Wars." "I asked myself periodically, 'If you'd known it was going to be this difficult, would you have done it?' And I always said yes, because I think in the end it is unique." The makers of "Roger Rabbit" agree that they have shared a once-in-a-lifetime experience - and once is probably enough. As the price went up and production fell behind schedule, the creative forces marshaled by Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment were subjected to unrelenting pressure from sharp-penciled businessmen at Disney. The project was blessed with exceptional talent and energy but beset by technical and logistical difficulties. This ground-breaking movie, made with the secrecy typical of a Spielberg production, exacted a high price emotionally as well as financially. I know it's a wonderful, pioneering experiment. "I believe we are the only company that could and would do this," says Jeffrey Katzenberg, chairman of Disney Studios. The pioneering animation effort is a risk that the studio, flush with box office success and keenly aware of its animation heritage, can afford to take. In many ways this gamble represents Disney at its best. Disney won't say exactly how much "Roger Rabbit" cost, but the studio acknowledges that its original $27.5 million budget is only a memory. In the unlikely event that "Roger Rabbit" doesn't catch on, Disney will wind up eating one of the biggest budgets in motion picture history, rumored to be somewhere between $40 million and $50 million. An army of animators and special effects technicians in London, Los Angeles and Marin County, Calif., worked thousands of hours to breathe life into the cartoon figures. That illusion didn't come easy, and it didn't come cheap. He can almost reach out and grab your lapels. He can sit on a couch nervously rattling a real coffee cup. They take up space, and they interact with real objects. Roger and his cartoon-character companions are by no means flat cutouts flitting across the screen they look rounded, three-dimensional. Eventually, Roger might rival the Great Mouse himself.īut "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" is much more than a cartoon: The movie mixes animation and live action to create an extraordinary effect never before seen. Steven Spielberg and Walt Disney Pictures want to make him a star.īut then, Roger is no mere mortal: He's a cartoon character who's making his debut Wednesday in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" His creators spared no effort to make the sputtering, excitable rabbit into an endearing and enduring personality, potentially as famous as the stars who make cameo appearances in the movie - Bugs Bunny, Donald Duck, Woody Woodpecker and Betty Boop, among others. Roger Rabbit is about to get a break most actors only dream about. ![]()
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