Colorfully frantic, with every human and 'toon vying for their share of the laughs...

Rating: 5/10 (27 August 2006)

A cartoon rabbit is framed for murder and seeks the help of a human gumshoe to solve the case. Director Robert Zemeckis admirably, seamlessly managed to bring together live-action and old-school animation with this 1940's slapstick tale set mostly in Hollywood, but the screenplay, adapted from Gary Wolf's book, seems to have gotten lost in the mad rush to fill the picture with every eye-popping visual trick the filmmakers could come up with. There's enough color here to fill ten pictures (with energy to spare), but the plot is so weak it's eventually rendered negligible, and all the pushing and shouting (from both the main players and the newly-created animated characters) is literally exhausting. Many Walt Disney and Warner Bros. cartoon favorites pop up in cameos, and it's certainly a treat to see them sharing the screen, but without a strong story-framework to make everybody's time worthwhile, the movie just becomes a frantic trip down memory lane--with no rest-stops. ** from ****