Who Framed Roger Rabbit [VHS]
This zany, eye-popping, knee-slapping landmark in combining  animation with live-action ingeniously makes that uneasy  combination itself (and the history of Hollywood) its subject.Who Framed Roger Rabbitis based on classic L.A.  private-eye movies (and, specifically,Chinatown), with  detective Eddie Valiant (Bob Hoskins) investigating a case involving adultery, blackmail, murder, and a fiendish plot to replace Los Angeles's  once-famous Red Car public transportation system with the  automobiles and freeways that would later make it the nation's  smog capital. Of course, his sleuthing takes him back to the place  he dreads: Toontown, the ghetto for cartoons that abuts Hollywood and  that was the site of a tragic incident in Eddie's past. In addition  to intermingling cartoon characters with live actors and locations,Roger Rabbitalso brings together the greatest array of cartoon stars in the history of motion pictures, from a variety of studios (Disney, Warner Bros., MGM, Fleischer, Universal, and elsewhere): Betty Boop, Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse, Woody Woodpecker, Droopy Dog, and more! And, of course, there's Maroon Cartoon's greatest  star, Roger Rabbit (voice by Charles Fleischer), who suspects his  ultracurvaceous wife, Jessica Rabbit (voice by Kathleen Turner: "I'm not  bad; I'm just drawn that way"), of infidelity. Directed by Robert Zemeckis (Back to the Future,Forrest Gump,Contact), not  since the early Looney Tunes' "You Oughtta Be in Pictures" has  there been anything likeRoger Rabbit.--Jim Emerson