Tales of the Rat Fink

As a member of Rat Finks of America, I have a very high standard for all that is Fink, and Ron Mann's "Tales of a Rat Fink" did not disappoint. This jacked-up semi-animated documentary of the hotrod culture's greatest patriarch, Ed "Big Daddy" Roth is a film that entertains and teaches us how and why we are obsessed with customizing cars. Roth was an enigmatic soul, a freethinker and rule breaker, and Mann has captured his essence with original film making and stylized story telling. Though he was an iconoclast, Roth wanted his work to appeal to all audiences--kids and adults, and this film follows in that image. There is so much detail and substance here, yet the film speeds by and changes lanes as necessary without refueling. It was a joy to watch and will serve generations to come. Long live Rat Fink!!

As a fan of Kustom Kulture, I enjoyed this unique collaborative as a tribute to one of it's most influential and commercially successful icons. While it was not a complete biography, it did capture the spirit of Ed Roth which lives on through his work and his fans.

There are so few of the original "kings" of Kustom Kulture living today (like master pin striper Lyle Fisk shown on the film's "bonus features" and kustom builder George Barris) while most of the kulture's founders (Von Dutch, Boyd Coddington and many others in addition to Bid Daddy) have passed. I would love to see a feature-length documentary on the history of Kustom Kulture and how that kulture is alive and well today.

Well, some of the silliness of the animations was a bit over the top but I figure they didn't have enough real footage to fill out an entire movie.

It was imaginative, and to its credit, it was a primer on the tremendous impact of this forgotten artist.

Forgotten? Well, I forgot about him. Wow, my brother was really into hot rods and he had all the magazines and the CARtoon books and such and I read all of the latter and marveled at Big Daddy's creativity, even in my early teens. Everything came rushing back when I saw this movie.

Let's face it, the guy was far out, he was into his thing, and he really did provide an inspiration for the art/media/design/culture that was to come in just a few years.

Wow.

Ed "Big Daddy" Roth must have been a kick to be around and this documentary does a good job highlighting his many artistic and mechanical triumphs. The one minor downfall of the film involves having a little too much animation which made me feel like I had actually lost equilibrium at times with colors and objects crashing onto the screen. All in all I would say it's a fun watch with many actors having a blast voicing Ed's cars. Motorheads will especially enjoy Tales of Rat Fink with all the cool old custom Hot Rods.

The creator of Rat Fink was one of my graphic heroes when I was younger, I tried to emulate his style, and now, because of the movie, he still is. Rat Fink rules, and so does the director of this Documentary, Ron Mann, who has given us rockin'docs about comic books, the twist and poetry in motion. Ron is one of the rare filmmakers who manage to preserve and capture important sections of American Popular Culture. He does so with wit, incredible attention to detail, music tracks, graphic presentation and engaging editing. He also seems to capture the zeitgeist in a way that no one else does in documentaryland. Who would've guessed that a film about Rat Fink could be an artful metaphor for many of the issues that define America today? I say 10 outta 10.