Viewers could easily believe that HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS is the LSD-fueled collaboration of Wile E. Coyote and the Monty Python gang, passed like a loaded bong to Dudley Doright, The Roadrunner, and 8-bit video game designers for production. And that still doesn’t come close to describing how weird this movie gets. Most of the characters in HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS (including all the beavers) are costumed in secondhand, rented high school mascot costumes, so you know the movie makers refuse to take themselves too seriously.
Physical comedy—slapstick—is really hard. This film does it well. BEAVERS is shot in old-timey black and white with text cards and scratches. The plot (like it even needs one) has our star Jean Kayak, a man fond of apple jack (XXX), stranded in a Wisconsin winter trying to hunt a meal. He is not great at it, and as his contraptions become sillier, the animals he tries to trap have no trouble turning his snares back on him. (There’s a bit with a couple of gay bunnies that had me laughing out loud while I was stranded at the airport.) Of course, the story needs a gruff fur trader whose mischievous and beautiful daughter has caught Jean’s eye. Included are the old trapper who shows Jean the way, and the wise Indian whose steed is, of course, two guys in a bad horse costume.
Jean’s fortunes turn and he is amassing the pile of beaver pelts he must have to trade for the trader’s daughter’s hand. The beavers and other furry friends are violently dispatched, but the entrails are crocheted yarn, and would make lovely pillows after production. The various Goldberg-esque contraptions border on genius, and all the Loony Tunes laws of physics are brought into play. Armed with these tools, he is on his way to winning the day, foes be dammed.
Oscar season at the Darkside has meant we are playing one highfalutin film after another about serious subjects and important people. HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS is the rejoinder to all that. The meta jokes and structure of the plot prove this is serious chaos. The esthetic is deliberate and brilliantly rendered and makes it all work.
Is it for everyone? Nope. But it’s the kind of stuff we do at the Darkside to prove we don’t take ourselves too seriously. Hunt up a ticket for this unique cinematic experience. You want to see this in a room with a bunch of laughing people. Ticket sales are open now.
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