50
Full of interesting visuals and illustrations, Tales of the Rat Fink would have made a really great introduction to a film that I never got to see.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
50
To those filmgoers who wouldn't know Rat Fink from Barton Fink, this reviewer's advice is: Pass. The latest counterculture tribute by Mann, director of 1988's "Comic Book Confidential" and 1999's "Grass," is as proudly silly as it is informative, and it can't help that a critical amount of brand coolness gets lost in the translation.
60
The New York Times by Jeannette Catsoulis
Depending on your age, sex and mechanical inclinations, Tales of the Rat Fink will convince you that Mr. Roth should either have been canonized or smothered at birth.
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) by Jennie Punter
Mann (Comic Book Confidential) plays with archive, animation and music (hot soundtrack by the Sadies), illuminating another worthy counter-culture corner. Pure fun, fun, fun.
70
Chicago Reader by Jonathan Rosenbaum
Some of Roth's cars become characters, their voices furnished by Ann-Margret, Jay Leno, Brian Wilson, Matt Groening, Tom Wolfe, and others. The pace never flags, and the enthusiasm is infectious.
88
A nonstop cavalcade of Roth-style animation starring Rat Fink, vintage footage, artfully animated black-and-white film, and fanciful "interviews" with beautifully preserved cars of the era.
78
Austin Chronicle by Marjorie Baumgarten
Tales of the Rat Fink is an ebullient survey of Roth's life that revs along with the zest a souped-up hot rod.
70
These hunks of greased lightning tell how a gearhead SoCal teen got wind of the post-World War II hot-rodding craze, crossed paths with a pinstriper named von Dutch and ended up as the automotive visionary whom Tom Wolfe famously called “a genius of the only uniquely American art form.”
75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer by Sean Axmaker
The colorful cultural history lesson in an idiosyncratic key is entertaining and informative, if a little indulgent in its adoration of Roth and his counter-car culture.