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Hundreds of Beavers Movie Review

Hundreds of Beavers is a 2024 silent slapstick comedy film directed by Mike Cheslik and starring Ryland Tews. This is a truly joyous viewing experience and one of the best films of the year.

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“J’accuse!“

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A drunken applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America’s greatest fur trapper by defeating hundreds of beavers. What a bolt of energy this movie is! As a big fan of classic cinema this was such a charming watch for me. It was not just shot entirely in black-and-white, but it’s also a silent film. Well, it does have a score and it also has a sound, but it has no dialogue to speak of with the exception of a couple of grunting sounds and small words spoken here and there.

This effectively made it a silent picture that was meant to be an homage to the golden era of slapstick – the 1920s Hollywood. The film’s humor was influenced by numerous sources from Buster Keaton to The Three Stooges etc. But the two biggest influences were clearly Charlie Chaplin and Looney Tunes. The two fit each other perfectly and the end result is an eclectic mix of Chaplin-like over-the-top facial expressions and body movements and cartoony scenarios that lacked any logic and the basic rules of physics.

So yes, Hundred of Beavers can be categorized pretty much as a live-action/animated hybrid given how much it used animated techniques in its production. The animation here is so creative and wildly original that it goes to show that you can still be very innovative in the area of slapstick filmmaking if you got the right mind and ideas for it. By far the most charming part of this feature is the use of costumes to sell the idea of animals.

This made the movie very endearing and also evocative of the earliest period in film history when such practices were quite common. Apparently, they got the costumes from a Chinese company online and they looked goofy in the best way possible. You both buy that these beavers are actually beavers in the context of the story, but you also are frequently reminded that they are just costumed humans numerous times and in very comedic ways, which was a really clever way to go about it.

There are other influences in the movie that range from detective fiction (Sherlock Holmes is parodied in a couple of scenes), Wes Anderson-inspired production design and, yes, even video games. There are numerous references to Nintendo franchises here, especially the likes of Mario and Zelda. I particularly loved that nod to RPGs in the fur trapper vendor’s shop. These ideas were so unique and charming that they elevated the movie to a very ambitious undertaking with phenomenal world building. This world felt very much lived in and also immensely cozy.

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The second act is concerned with the protagonist trying to catch as many beavers as possible through numerous traps and it was structured as a video game with higher levels of difficulty and bigger rewards. It pretty much functioned as a walkthrough of a game. While I found the idea ingenious, that overly extended sequence eventually grew tiresome in its endless repetition. This was the weakest part of a movie that only here reached boredom for me, but was otherwise consistently engaging and even riveting.

I much preferred the remainder of the picture. The first act sees the protagonist trying to catch different animals in various ways and almost always unsuccessfully. When the guy was least successful, the movie was at its funniest. When he became clever and competent is when the movie lost some of that goofy humor. But something else emerged in that third act and that is a genuine storyline. Not only was the basic plot of a guy wanting to get the girl a perfect fit for the silent era treatment, but the father was also hilarious in trying so hard to prevent the two’s union. The Master Fur Trapper is one of the film’s best characters – the spitting running gag was so well executed and the gay jokes were also very amusing.

The Furrier was also a very amusing character and the two’s romance was genuinely endearing. Every single scene set at the fur trapper’s house was a delight. But by far my favorite section is the one set at the beaver dam. This is where the movie reached impossibly ambitious and epic proportions in action set pieces, humorous situations, world building and even story. The twist that these beavers are actually highly intelligent and that they got this whole civilization going on in this dam was a brilliant one. It made the protagonist pretty much a genocider. Couple that with the film’s funny, but stereotypical depiction of a Native American character and you’ve got a movie that is not politically correct in the slightest, which I appreciated.

Hundreds of Beavers features incredibly elaborate production design, perfectly irreverent and goofy costumes, advanced animation techniques and it also benefits from a terrific score that evokes the silent era in such a glorious way. Every mood is so well evoked through these pieces as the music switches from romantic to thrilling to eerie while consistently being very enjoyable. The sound is also impeccable. So many silly sounds of grunting, confusion and anger are included and they are all quite amusing in their playful nature. The cinematography is fantastic and the snowy landscapes made it such an atmospheric treat.

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The character development is slight, but I still felt that they served their purpose and were all immensely memorable. The beavers fared the best among the creatures while Jean Kayak was such a fun protagonist played so well by the handsome and gifted comedian Ryland Tews. The movie was well edited and directed. For the most part I did not feel its length. The intertitles were so well incorporated and the film’s title coming in at such a late time was another ingenious gag in a film that has countless funny moments. It’s one of those comedies that won’t make you laugh per say, but it will make you smile and on a pretty consistent basis, which made it a treat for me.