Ron Mann at the March 11 world premiere of Tales of the Rat Fink Credit: Photo By Gary Miller

Tales of the Rat Fink

D: Ron Mann

The career of Ed “Big Daddy” Roth is a perfect fit for pop-culture documentarian Ron Mann. Roth, the California gearhead and artist, springs to life here in ways never achieved on paper by Tom Wolfe in his first book of essays, Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby. Mostly that’s due to the film’s massive use of animation (by Michael Roberts) and colorful voice work (from the likes of Jay Leno, Ann-Margret, the Smothers brothers, Steve Austin, Billy Gibbons, Brian Wilson, Matt Groening, and narrator John Goodman as the voice of Big Daddy). From Roth’s customized dragsters to his conceptual cars built from the newly invented fiberglass material to his creation of the iconic Rat Fink character and other cartoon monsters and the evolution of his comic book, T-shirt, and model-car empires, Roth was the seminal garage artist of the latter half of the 20th century. Tales of the Rat Fink is an ebullient survey of Roth’s life that revs along with the zest a souped-up hot rod.

4:30pm, Paramount

This article appears in March 17 • 2006.

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Marjorie Baumgarten is a film critic and contributing writer at The Austin Chronicle, where she has worked in many capacities since the paper's founding in 1981. She served as the Chronicle's Film Reviews editor for 25 years.