Hundreds of Beavers
Beavers are known as ‘ecosystem engineers’ due to their ability to create new wetlands and ponds via the dams and lodges they build. Bully for them. But if you’re an applejack salesman in 19th North America trying to make a living with your giant wooden kegs of liquid product, a few beavers could ruin your entire livelihood. It so happens that this is the exact setup in Hundreds of Beavers, a slapstick comedy from Mike Cheslik and (inhales) Ryland Brickson Cole Tews about a man who must face and defeat precisely that many beavers for a chance at survival, retribution and, if he’s lucky, a happily ever after.
In the snowy wilderness of midwest America lives Jean Kayak (Tews), an applejack salesman drunk off his own supply. So drunk in fact, that he doesn’t notice that beavers have chewed the legs off his applejack kegs and now the barrels are headed towards his homestead, where they will explode on impact. With his limited survival skills and a surplus of critters just there for the taking (and skinning, and eating), Jean Kayak must master the art of hunting, trapping and trading with a local merchant if he's going to last the winter.
A beaver in Sims mode.
There are a few problems. He has no tools or weapons and the ones sold by the merchant are priced on a sliding pelt scale by animal difficulty/danger. He should be able to start at the bottom but even the dumb bunnies aren’t falling for his traps and in the background, the beavers are building a massive lodge that makes a mockery of the home they helped destroy. Oh, and the wind keeps changing and putting his fire out. And a woodpecker keeps hammering at his head when he whistles after finally making a meal. And he keeps stepping on pinecones with bare feet.
The odds are stacked against Jean Kayak but he’s got the resilience of a cartoon character who can’t die, the build of Tormund Giantsbane and a mentor in an esteemed fur trapper who can show him the way. As we follow Jean Kayak through his trapping loop we see him gain experience and level up his inventory by defeating more complex creatures and trading their pelts for better weapons. Hundreds of Beavers is a zero to hero tale with no dialogue and only grainy black and white film capturing its story. But with a consistently hilarious script and resourceful, innovative filmmaking, words and colour somehow seem redundant.
My wares are only for the strongest beings and you are of the weakest.
This is Cheslik’s directorial debut and his second collaboration with Tews on a feature. They worked together on the 2018 Tews’ directed film Lake Michigan Monster and co-wrote Beavers during its production. Where that film was made with a mere $7000, Beavers took lots of time and $150,000 (still pennies in the grand scheme of things). Cheslik also edited and created the film’s visual effects in Adobe After Effects over two years on his home computer, with the total production taking five years to complete.
In an interview with No Film School he explains that he “used Shutterstock elements and hid the shoddy comps with grainy black and white.” Tews’ father Wayne composed and performed songs for the film, notably the banging opening tavern song ‘Jean Kayak and His Acme Applejack’ with The Seafield Monster Sextet, with the rest of the music licensed from the De Wolfe music library.
The greatest fur trapper who ever sleighed.
The film was shot by a six-person crew over three months in Wisconsin and Michigan with the help of green screen, a real historical cabin and a merchant’s stand constructed by Tews’ dad, and a bunch of animal suits purchased off a Chinese mascot website and altered by friends and family. The total cast could be counted on two hands, with people in suits duplicated to create the larger scale shots in a tactic Cheslik took from the Lord Of The Rings special features.
Hundreds of Beavers was self-released after the team had no luck finding a distributor and has since become a bit of a cult hit, premiering in Canada at Fantasia International Film Festival and finding its footing in other festivals across the globe. Its inspiration comes from Super Mario, Looney Tunes and slapstick greats like Chaplin, Keaton, Abbott and Costello and The Three Stooges. There are even some tonal similarities to the likes of SpongeBob and Adventure Time. It’s clear that this is a labour of love and the result of a bunch of friends just going out and making a movie together, obstacles be damned.
All things considered, Hundreds of Beavers is an astonishing achievement in filmmaking, and one that I absolutely ate up. It’s hysterically funny throughout and the laughs come from every direction, whether that’s its silent film inspired slapstick, visual gags, innuendo, absurdist moments that break the suspension of disbelief or the comically long distance between the start of the film and its title card. It takes Show, Don’t Tell literally and pulls it off for the entire runtime, a feat I thought would wear out but just escalates as the film goes along.
The merchant’s daughter, whose kink is getting her suitors in trouble with Dad.
There are also surprising (if brief) moments of tenderness, like a tale of the bunny lifecycle told in footprints, Jean Kayak’s smittenness with the merchant’s daughter (played by YouTuber Olivia Graves), and the snowpeople/dogs he builds in his solitude so that his success at finally catching a fish doesn’t go unwitnessed. Despite all the silliness, we really are watching a man learn and better himself, and credit should go to Tews who pulls it off with physicality and expression alone.
Hundreds of Beavers is a success not just in spite of its shoestring budget but because of the resourcefulness and ingenuity used by its small team in making it. We were fortunate enough to see the film in the cinema during its limited run at Revelation Film Festival and it is quite unlike anything I’ve seen in a feature directorial debut. It’s a damn shame that there’s no cinema release slated for Australia; still, it’s a great film to watch in the comfort of your home with your favourite furry friends and a pitcher of mulled cider to warm you up.
Verdict:
☆☆☆☆☆
Hundreds of Beavers is available on demand via Amazon or Apple (with a VPN).
