The Laws of Physics in an Animation Universe

Cory Fuller

Art/Physics 123

Prof. Garcia

October 19, 2010

The Laws of Physics in Who Framed Roger Rabbit

            The film Who Framed Roger Rabbit creates a parallel reality where animated cartoon characters exist side-by-side real live human beings.  The movie takes place during the golden age of animation but instead of artists drawing out cartoons they are acted by “Toon” actors and filmed just like live action movies. The toon’s that exist in this reality adhere to different laws of physics because they have to do everything that  real cartoon characters do.

            Who Framed Roger Rabbit tells the story of private detective Eddie, who takes on a murder case. The suspect, a toon named Roger Rabbit, is believed to have murdered Marvin Acme (the Hollywood gag king) because he was involved with Roger’s wife.  Eddie teams up with Roger to discover the true killer.  Through out the film Eddie and other human characters interact often with the toon characters. Through these interactions the viewer can see that the toons and humans follow very different laws of physics.  There are three main laws of physics where the difference between humans and toons are apparent; they are the laws of inertia and acceleration, the law of gravity, and the action/reaction principle. 

            Throughout the film the antagonist Judge Dune, and his gang of toon weasels pursue Eddie and Roger.  They want to arrest roger for murder and there are many parts in the movie where Eddie and Roger are on the run. One particular scene in the film that deals with the laws of inertia and acceleration is when Eddie and Roger are part of a car chase.  In this scene the weasels are chasing Eddie and Roger.  They are able to catch a ride in a toon cab and drive rapidly to escape the weasels.  While riding in the toon cab Eddie and Roger take many sharp turns and the viewer can see that Roger, doesn’t follow the laws of inertia and acceleration.

              The reason that things move has to do with Newton’s three basic laws of motion.  Two of these laws, inertia and acceleration play a key role in the car chase scene.  The law of inertia states that an object moves with constant, uniform motion until it becomes unbalanced. This means that an object will continue to do what it is doing.  The law of acceleration states that that object will continue to do what it is doing until it is acted upon by a force.  This will cause the object to change motion.  The reason that inertia and acceleration are important to this scene is because in real life a human traveling in a car would experience a lot of drag when the car took sharp turns.  However in the film when the cab takes sharp turns Roger follows the motion of the cab, but in reality he would experience drag due to the laws of inertia and acceleration.

            Drag is what happens when the law of acceleration is applied to an object.  For an example when a person is standing in a moving bus, when the bus stops that person will continue to move forward slightly because the law of inertia is keeping them moving forward but the law of acceleration is changing their motion..  So, when the cab that Roger and Eddie are riding in during the car chase take sharp turns roger is defying the laws of physics when he follows the motion of the cab. In reality Roger would continue to move forward because of the law of inertia, but would be forced in the direction of the turn, experiencing drag, by the law of acceleration.  By comparison, in another scene in the movie where Eddie crashes his real car into another real car we feel the inertia as he is thrown forward, and the forced back by the law of acceleration when the seat belt stops him.

            Just as the laws of inertia and acceleration affect toons and humans differently so does the law of gravity.  Objects and characters when they fall are pulled toward the ground in an arc.  This occurs because the law of inertia keeps an object going once motion has been started, but the law of gravity pulls it toward the ground.  The toons in Who Framed Roger Rabbit follow very different laws when it comes to gravity, sometimes defying it entirely.

            Near the end of the film Eddie and Jessica Rabbit (Roger’s wife and another toon), are flung from a taxicab when it hits a lamb post.  The way that Eddie flies from the cab and the way that Jessica flies from the cab are very different.  When Eddie goes flying he obeys the law gravity. The cab stops so suddenly the previous inertia is still acting upon him.  Eddie flies forward out of the cab, but the law of gravity pulls him to the ground, causing Eddie to fall from the cab to the ground in an arc.  Eddie also rotates head over heels while in the air.  When Jessica is thrown from the cab she doesn’t travel in an arc. Inertia keeps her going forward but instead of gravity pulling her to the ground in an arc, Jessica travels in a straight line that is angled so she reaches the ground.  Jessica also doesn’t rotate headfirst like Eddie does; she remains in an upright-seated position while spinning in a circle, she then hits the ground and bounces before coming to a settle.  Other examples of altered laws of gravity take place constantly in the movie. In one scene Eddie throws his whiskey bottle up in the air and shoots at it with a toon gun.  The humanoid cartoon bullet flies up into the air then stops and chops the whiskey bottle in half.  The bullet defies the law of acceleration when it is able to stop in mid air without force acting upon it.  Gravity also doesn’t act upon the bullet because it is able to hover in the air while chopping the bottle in half.  Another example is at the end of the film where Judge Dune jumps after Eddie while wearing a pair of cartoon spring-loaded shoes.  When Judge Dune jumps toward Eddie instead of falling in a arc, he is sent up into the air, then travels toward Eddie in a straight line and comes back down to the ground, settling very lightly.  In reality he would be sent up into the air and then fall back down to the ground in a parabolic arc, due to the law of gravity and inertia.

            The last law of physics that applies differently to toons and humans is the law of action/reaction. The law of action/reaction states that for every action there is an equal reaction force in the opposite direction.  We see this law broken mainly when characters in the film are firing guns. In reality, because of the action/reaction principle if someone were to fire a gun they would feel a significant amount of kick back, which would result from the force of the gun reacting upon the person firing it. However there are many scenes in Who Framed Roger Rabbit where a toon will fire a gun and feel no kick back, or a human will fire a toon gun and feel no kick back.  A scene that demonstrates this well is at the beginning of the film where two toons are playing the piano on stage.  One fires a cannon at the other and there is no reaction on the character from the cannon. 

            Looking back at the examples given earlier it is apparent that there are a few instances within the film where humans adhere to the same laws of physics as the toons.  For example when Eddie enters toon town and rides in the elevator. Here, even though Eddie is a human being the cartoon laws of physics apply to him.  When Eddie enters an elevator in toon town it travels so fast that the inertia presses his body into a flat circle on the floor.  The elevator then stops so abruptly that Eddie is thrown against the ceiling. 

 It could be argued that this is an inconsistency with in the film’s world, however if close attention were to be paid it would be clear that humans only follow cartoon laws of physics when they are physically interacting with toon objects, or if they have entered a toon building or automobile.  It could be argued that as humans get more immersed within the toon world they follow toon laws more closely.

            In conclusion, in the world of Who Framed Roger Rabbit humans and toons follow different laws of physics, because toons must be able to do all the same motions that cartoons in the real world do.  By analyzing different scenes, and the main laws of physics (inertia and acceleration, gravity and action/reaction) that help to create the world, the viewer sees how physics applies to toons and humans differently, and how as humans are more immersed within the toon world they themselves begin to follow toon laws of physics.

Word Count: 1502