It is always, always a delight to see a movie that should not exist. Whether the artistic ambition is implausible or the plot is incredible, it’s always a pleasure to see the impossible, especially when it’s so determined to entertain us. Hundreds of Beavers is a mixed-media (part live-action, part animated) cartoon with all the silly violence, disdain for the laws of physics, and over-the-top emotions this implies. And if that wasn’t enough, it was filmed in black and white and largely without language. How did something not only this stupid but also this magnificent actually happen?
Jean Kayak (Ryland Brickson Cole Tews, who co-wrote the script with director Mike Cheslik) is a humble applejack maker in the wintry woods of what will eventually become Wisconsin. When his still is destroyed by beavers, Jean Kayak finds himself alone in the forest with only the clothes on his back and his wits for survival. But there are plenty of creatures about, and once he learns to hunt, he’ll even be able to eat. The animals are either animated creations or played by people in animal suits, if you please, and the forest is populated with rabbits, fish, skunks, raccoons and wolves in addition to the beavers. The beavers are up to something, slowly stopping the river with a large creation, which makes for fertile hunting. At the start Jean Kayak is absolutely terrible at it. Fortunately, a master trapper (Wes Tank) with a sledge and a pack of dogs briefly takes Jean under his wing, and later Jean is also able to trade with an Indian trapper (Luis Rico), who has a horse (two people in a costume, obviously). But the best supplies are from the gun-toting merchant (Doug Mancheski), whose fetching daughter (Olivia Graves) is also his furrier. (When she skins the pelts, the costumes open to reveal a human skeleton and stuffed body parts, such as heart-shaped pillows.) Jean takes a shine to her, to the merchant’s great disapproval, but the motivation to afford a ring for the furrier kicks his hunting skills up a notch.
But most of the time, Jean is trudging through the forest alone, experimenting with animal traps that would put the Coyote and his bottomless resources to shame. He is very good at gnawing crucifixes with his teeth, for example; they’re great for catching beavers. No opportunity for a visual joke is missed – the dogs playing cards a personal favourite – and the stakes continue to escalate even as Jean becomes better at making his way in the world. There are kung fu fights. A high speed chase. Detective beavers that for copyright purposes do not resemble Holmes and Watson. More importantly, there’s a wild and wildly dramatic sense of animal unpredictability that’s a little like Wes Anderson’s stop-motion animation, except centered around Mr. Tews’ ludicrous and ludicrously good performance. He is clearly a superstar of physical comedy whose facial expressions should be studied in schools.
If one could make a complaint, it might be that some of the jokes are repeated a little too often, but on the other hand, the occasional predictability makes the frequent chaos even funnier. Despite all the animals which are killed there is none of the spite which sours Quentin Dupieux’s work, and there’s none of the soiled sexuality as seen in the animation of Dash Shaw. Instead this really does feel like a Warner Brothers cartoon, built around a freezing, gurning redhead in a (very, very fake) coonskin cap. The fact it’s been distributed theatrically in the UK is a giant surprise, especially since it was only VOD in the USA, but this is the country who gave the world slapstick in the form of Mr. Bean, Monty Python, Miranda Hart, Bottom, and others. Mr. Tews and Mr. Cheslik (who went to high school together) must have watched a billion cartoons growing up and then decided to go one better. They actually did it, and did it well. Hundreds of Beavers is an adorable miracle.
Hundreds of Beavers is available on digital in the U.K. and now playing in limited theaters.
Find out more information at the film’s official website.