Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Is it just me or does it seem like its become a bit of a forgotten giant after release? I mean no its far from unknown yet compared to a lot of the icons of 80's blockbuster cinema like ET, Starwars, Indiana Jones, Ghostbusters or Zemeckis's own Back to the Future it feels like its talked about far less.

I mean that's surely not due to a lack of success at the time as it raked it in and I wouldn't really say a lack of quality either as when it is discussed its generally praised. Maybe the issue is that coming out in 1988 it ended up being overshadowed by the advent of large scale CGI in the early 90's and the shift in the tone of blockbusters?

The film got a lot of hype at the time(indeed one of the first films I was old enough to really pick up on it doing so aged 10) but I think you could perhaps argue that actually a lot of the long term cultural memory of many of those 80's blockbusters depended just as much or more on bedding in on VHS and cable for several years afterwards. Yet I think you could argue Roger Rabbit didn't get as much time to do that before trends turned against it with the likes of T2, Jurassic Park, etc.

Agree, there was a huge shift in special effects just after the movie came out that overshadows the technical achievement of WFRR.

Might also be down to the marketing too, as I mentioned it was heavily marketed at kids which will have a subconscious effect on anyone who was around when it was first released.
I can still remember the adverts for the cereals: Typical smiling kids and Roger Rabbit doing zany stuff, making the kids laugh and playing with the toys found in the cereal boxes.

The Goonies tends to get overlooked as well sometimes for similar reasons.
People see it as a kids movie, and it was marketed at kids on time of release, yet in the UK it carries a 15 rating and is filled with swearing. In fact, the first line spoken by one of the kids, he says "Oh wow! A Police chase! Aw sh*t!"