As a modern fairy tale, "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" not only fascinates children with its magnificent, fantastic colors and whimsical artistic imagination, but many adults are also attracted to it and talk about it. The film director has a very clever and creative idea in the overall grasp of art and modeling design: it reproduces the Disney cartoon kingdom in the golden age of the 1940s as a narrative strategy, and adopts the film technology of the 1980s. The latest method, ingeniously entangled and merged real people and cartoon animal characters, so as to give animation movies a new style and new charm.
It is known that in the long history of American Hollywood movies, the late 1930s and 1940s marked a glorious period in the development of cartoon films. The famous cartoon artist Disney, with his fantastic ideas full of fairy tales, created on the screen popular fairy tales such as Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Bambi the Fawn, and Pinocchio the puppet. Artistic image. These fairy tale images have a prominent common feature: funny, funny, full of comedic humor, and vividly embody all kinds of useful moral fables or life enlightenment. They have had an important impact not only in the United States, but also in many parts of the world.
"Roger Rabbit" is the reconstruction and revival of Disney cartoon art, showing its unusual significance. "Roger Rabbit" became a well-known fairy tale star in the United States in the summer of 1988, and won the first place in the 10 best-selling films in the American film market that year. This new cartoon film took nearly three years from proposing creative ideas and conceiving, to specific planning and production at the same time in London, England and Los Angeles, United States, and to the final synthesis. The total production cost was as high as 45 million U.S. dollars. Especially in the technical production and synthesis of images, how to control the coordination of real-life performances and cartoon characters on the same screen, the film’s creators have made fruitful contributions, and have been hailed by the American film critics as "a history of the development of film technology." milestone".
This film is based on Gary K. Wolf’s best-selling novel of the same name. As far as narrative construction is concerned, the film focuses on highlighting the situation in which Roger the anthropomorphized rabbit is framed and hunted for no reason; at the same time, Parallel and intertwined, it describes the heroic feats of private detective Eddie from revenge for the individual to justice for the cartoon world, and finally, the rescue of Roger Rabbit and his cartoon races is the end of the "reunion". This plot/narrative structure generally follows the genre model of black detective films + comedy films, and obviously does not have much profound social connotations. However, what people should not ignore is that this two-line juxtaposed plot concept and its artistic expression have a cordial human touch and a certain allegory, especially the whole film uses the crisis of Roger Rabbit and his cartoon city on the verge of destruction. The backbone of the narrative, as well as the venom of "Deffer" that Justice Doum wants to kill the cartoons, all project a certain secular color. Here, the fate of Roger and his cartoon race, who are in trouble for no reason, is obviously a implicit and tortuous metaphor for racial problems in Western society (such as disregard for blacks and some ethnic minorities, discrimination, and human rights inequality). ; And the love between Roger and his beautiful and sexy wife Jessica turned out to be a "fuse" that triggered all kinds of contradictions. In the animation styling, she also made comical exaggerations. For example, her red lips could be used as a "blow kiss" outside the ejection outlet, and her huge breast peak could be used as an upward sensation. All of these were obviously promoted to A symbol and a metaphor for the "sex" problem in Western society. Although the story is set in the cartoon city in 1947, the entanglements and conflicts between real people and cartoon characters, and the comic resolution of this conflict, all have some characteristics of Western society in the 1980s, and they are finally reached in the film. A dreamlike "reunion" ending satisfies the audience's desire for social catharsis (especially small people and weak groups).
This film is co-directed by two directors, one is Robert Zemekis, who has successfully filmed "Legend of Gems" and "Back to the Future". His sense of humor, originality and rich imagination are deep. Highly acclaimed; the other is the British cartoon genius Richard Williams. His cartoon "A Christmas Carol" won the 1972 Academy Award. The executive producer of the film is the famous director Steven Spielberg. Their very tacit artistic cooperation has made new excavations for the artistic expression possibilities of cartoon (animation) films, which are a special kind of film, and formed a number of artistic and creative characteristics.
One of the artistic creativity: the combination of cartoon characters and real people not only achieves a unified state in the technical production of animation, but also cleverly organizes the relationship between the two in an aesthetically meaningful plot-narrative mechanism. In the early Disney films, there were scenes such as Disney performing on stage with Donald Duck, sailors and cartoon puppies dancing "dancing couple", but most of them were limited to showing the novelty of cartoon skills or the fun of singing and dancing. Real people and cartoons. The role does not have a plot-narrative relationship. In "Roger Rabbit", the "Thun City" inhabited by the cartoon races is given a kind of illusory and true environmental atmosphere. The cartoon characters are personified and entangled with the real world of human beings. Roger Rabbit and the cartoonized beauty Jessica became a life-and-death couple. Roger was framed and the cartoon city was on the verge of destruction, or it was caused by the greed of the cartoon film company owner Malone in chasing profits, or the cause Due to the ambition of Justice Doom, who is in charge of the security of Thun City, to dominate the cartoon world, this obviously constitutes a criticism of the relationship between capitalism and the evil of capital (though not necessarily so profound).
Artistic creativity two: the creation of the tragic and comedic character of Roger Rabbit. It can be said that this is the birth of another new cartoon star after Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. His situation of being framed innocently indicates the tragic fate of small social figures and the weak and small races in a socially helpless position, but they are presented everywhere in the unique way of cartoon comedy and mirror language. Roger Rabbit has a sincere, kind, and optimistic character, very lively and lovely. The modeling design of this cartoon character is strong in action and full of fun. Even in the predicament of being hunted down, he still joked with Eddie with handcuffs. As a result, the two were "handcuffed" together and could be opened without a key. When the Weasel squad came to search for it, he actually performed a wonderful scene hiding in the washing machine. Comedy; when he took refuge in the bar, he also performed burlesque performances for people, "smashing" the plate above his head to amusement, not knowing what the trouble is; when he and Jessica were "hanged" together to be executed at the critical moment of life and death , He still confessed his love to Jessica passionately, naive and infatuated. In particular, Roger has two styling passages where he went crazy after drinking, one was the sorrow of being mad while drunk, and the other was the excitement of drunkenness to break free from the magic hand of Justice Dum. Roger seemed to be given a "special function." , Give full play to the specialties of animation modeling, do the best of comedy exaggeration, make Roger's character come alive and full of the charm of cartoon art.
Artistic creativity 3: Private detective Eddie Valente, a heroic image portrayed in the "anti-hero" color, is given the role of a white savior. In the relatively closed and fictitious world of Cartoon City, Roger Rabbit was caught in a difficult position at the beginning, unable to save himself and fight, and was in a passive situation. In this way, Eddie, who was at first down and out of shape, follows the plot— The advancement of the narrative became the white hero who saved Rogers from fire and water. At the beginning, he was determined to avenge his brother who died, and then he was determined to bring justice to the weak cartoon race represented by Roger. Developed to a climax, he fought the Justice Dum, who was wearing a black hat, sunglasses and a hideous face, and eventually put him to death. He became the most characteristic white hero in the American genre movie myths who helped the poor and relieved the violence. The famous British actor Bob Hoskins, with his successful creation of the image of Eddie, immediately became a favorite "superstar".
It is worth noting that the plot-narrative driving force of the modern fairy tale "Roger Rabbit" generally follows the narrative pattern of American genre movies, often in an illusory (commonly desired) way to resolve contradictions. , Instead of making a sober and severe analysis of actual contradictions. The ending of the "reunion" in which Rogers are rescued in the film is more like a modern fantasy. The Achilles heel of American genre movies and their counterculture can be seen here.
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