Noir and Roger Rabbit

Posted by: Melinda on Apr 30, 2011 Print PDF

Tagged in: writing

Because of my friend George's marvelous HBO series I once again subscribe to HBO.  Which means that I can watch movies while I'm cooking or cleaning up the kitchen.  The other day WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT was on.  I've always liked the movie, but now I have a far greater appreciation of how closely to the noir formula the writers hewed, and what a wonderful job they did.

I'd never read Chandler or Hammett, I'm embarrassed to admit.  Oh, I'd seen Bogie in The Maltese Falcon, but I hadn't actually read any of the seminal works.  The closest I'd come was Ross McDonald who I think is a brilliant writer, but he wasn't the originator of the form.

While I was traveling in Australia last year I needed paper books while airplanes took off and landed.  The IPad was great once we were in the air, but I have a restless nature, and I can't just sit even for takeoffs and landings.  So my traveling companion loaned me several of his noir mysteries.

What became rapidly apparent is that a formula was born, and like all good formulas it serves it's purpose -- it's familiar without being trite, exciting because the reader/viewer can anticipate what is coming next, and comforting because you know right will triumph.

So, here I am watching Roger Rabbit, and by god it's all there.  There's the burnt out detective with a tragedy in his past.  There's the dangerous femme fatale who you suspect is behind the murder, at a critical point in the story the detective stumbles across a dead body, but doesn't go to the authorities, the detective is always at odds with the authorities, a critical witness is shot.  In Roger Rabbit there is a dame/twist/chick/frail with a heart-of-gold who has stuck by the burnt out detective.

I was just charmed and delighted, and I ended up enjoying the movie even more now that I had a small background in noir mysteries.  It just shows that a deeper understanding of the antecedents of anything can deepen the appreciation whether it's noir mysteries, dressage, opera, dance, etc.

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written by William H Stoddard, April 30, 2011
I don't know noir in depth, but I've seen some of the classics, including Touch of Evil, which is even darker than most noir, and I've read The Maltese Falcon, which was well worth it. You're right about Roger Rabbit fitting the pattern. Another interesting variant on it is Veronica Mars, with its corrupt city government, scheming rich people, investigator constantly at odds with the police, and tangled motives; the fact that the investigator is the same sex and about the same age as Nancy Drew initially put me off from watching it, but it only took a few episodes for me to spot the classic patterns. Of course the classic question for teenage detectives is "how does this kid get away with investigating crimes?" but the first season did a fairly plausible job of rationalizing that.
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Veronica Mars
written by Melindas, April 30, 2011
I love Veronica Mars. It was a wonderfully tight first season. You reached the end, and you realized that every clue was there to solve the mystery. And the father/daughter relationship was just fantastic. I even enjoyed the other seasons though I don't they they had a much time to plan as they did with the first season. George R.R. and Daniel Abraham have had this on going debate about what is more satisfying -- a show that ends really well, wraps things up in a satisfying way, Babylon 5 (I'm told, I haven't watched it), Veronica Mars, the fifth season of Buffy, or a show that fails at the conclusion -- Lost, Battle Star Galactica, but has great episodes along the way. I want the satisfying ending. The journey alone is not enough for me.
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Context and tradition
written by Wolf Lahti, April 30, 2011
"A deeper understanding of the antecedents of anything can deepen the appreciation"

Very true, but there is a limit as to how far this can go without departing from what is acceptable. It happens more in the art world than in fiction, where one commonly finds the equivalent of some questionable painting, say, justified by saying that you can understand it only if you know X and Y about the artist's past. This turns the work into little more than an in joke, and if you're not in on the joke, you are made to feel unsophisticated.

I believe that for the most part, a work of art should be able to stand alone and be appreciated on its own. But then questions of inescapable cultural context come into force, where it is clear that nothing ever really stands on its own, and it gets all muddled.
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written by Melindas, April 30, 2011
That's an excellent point, Wolf, and I certainly agree. I think a lot of what passes for "serious fiction" New Yorker stuff and prize winners are just Lit Crit types talking to each other. But we do it in science fiction too. Since it's beginnings we've been having conversations with each other, and borrowing tropes. Sometimes I worry that a new comer to S.F. would be completely lost. Especially if they tried to start with a book like A FIRE UPON THE DEEP. Brilliant book, but perhaps impenetrable to outsiders.

I think the issue with "low prestige fiction" romance, science fiction, mysteries is that they are accessible to readers and they focus on story rather than style, and personally, I prefer that. I'm just saying that if you've read widely in a field you are going to get more out of a particular book then a newcomer.
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written by Syd Henderson, April 30, 2011
You've got a pretty good taste of Hammett anyway. "The Maltese Falcon" is very close in feel to the novel. Actually, it improves on it.
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"That's pronounced Ro-zhay!"
written by Walter Jon Williams, May 01, 2011
I last saw Roger Rabbit in a hotel room in France. It was great hearing the French voices on all the well-known cartoon characters, especially Bugs Bunny.

"Ca va, docteur?"
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The Falcon
written by Walter Jon Williams, May 01, 2011
I have this whole lecture about how modern audiences can't view the Maltese Falcon as the original audience saw it. Rather than repeat it here, I'll just send you to it:

http://www.walterjonwilliams.net/2007/08/thin-man-thick-plot/
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Toon noir
written by Tengland, May 02, 2011
The movie works on many levels, one being the noir and another being toon culture, which would be jist as mad place as portrayed. (This from a cartoon freak, who paid attention to the toons only at first, then got the noir stuff on subsequent viewings. Hey, we all have our priorities.)
BTW, it's "Who Framed Roger Rabbit." The book was who "killed" or "murdered" or something, but the book was terrible so don't even bother. This is a case where the movie-makers did a much better save on the story.
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written by rand, May 04, 2011
@ Tengland:
The novel was called, "Who Censored Roger Rabbit?" & you're right, it's awful. & nothing like the film. It's 1 of the rare instances where the film is far superior to its reference material.
There's also a spin-off novel called, "Who P-P-P-Plugged Roger Rabbit?" that vainly tries to capitalize on the success of the movie. Unfortunately, again, the author did not rise to the occasion.
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written by Melindas, May 04, 2011
Thanks for the correction on the title, guys. I fixed it in the post. Much appreciated. I never read the book, just watched the movie which I loved. It really was a love letter to cartoons in all their various forms. I'm a big Coyote/Road Runner fan. Must be my New Mexico background. smilies/smiley.gif
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Noir and Roger Rabbit
written by Equine Art, January 02, 2012
I have loved this film ever since it was first made, but this DVD really does not do it justice.

Despite being called a 'special edition', it contains not a single extra feature. The widescreen format is not anamorphic, which means that the MPEG aspect ratio is 4:3 and the picture resolution of the viewable area is lower than it should be. The quality of the film print used is poor and contains scratches and white speckling. The film has also had some bits edited out, so I suppose you could say it contains a negative number of special features: i.e. some normal features taken out. This is a shocking misuse of the format because the DVD standard contains the possibility for having optional scenes which can be shielded from young viewers, so why wasn't this used?

I doubt it will be long before the next version comes out, the 'collector's special edition' or whatever they will call it, so my advice would be to wait for that.

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