Hundreds of Beavers

Before seeing the movie at the Hamburg Fantasy Filmfest, I wondered how an hour and a half of playtime can be filled with the ideas in the trailer without getting slow or tedious. Now I actually wonder when it was the last time I laughed that much through a whole movie.

While delivering a consistent, smart, reduced and extremely efficient visual syle, the presentation doesn't let your focus away for one second, otherwise you might miss something funny. The way it symbolizes, repeats and develops the events by smart iteration in a limited universe ist ist excellent!

I highly recommend seeing it. Not for small kids.

A black and white, essentially silent film has never been this much fun, nor has it been crafted with such exuberant adolescent heart, yet Hundreds of Beavers channels all of its ambitious, lo-fi energy into one of the most exhilarating gut-busting films I've seen in quite some time. Scrabbled together with no money, six beaver costumes, and spare time with friends Mike Cheslik creates a Looney-Tunes-level physical comedy romp, enlisting endless sight gags and simple plot mechanics that only get bigger, better, and sillier. The one-note story of an applejack farmer becoming a master beaver hunter gets elevated by revenge, romance, and subtle intelligence, leading to a climax full of payoffs that have been carefully placed throughout its runtime, amplifying Hundreds of Beavers' ability and soul. While the film isn't necessarily an emotional one, I found myself moved, if not for the characters than for the filmmaking. With no studio backing or theatrical distribution, Hundreds of Beavers has nothing to leverage and nothing to sacrifice, it's inherently itself through and through to the very end. Doing so, it soars to such great giddy heights that it's unwaveringly momentous that so much imagination still exists and proves there's still so much more to make, a true testament to the power of visual storytelling.

I first heard of this movie from YMS, shoutout to him, and I'm glad I decided to go ahead and rent it as soon as it was available. The premise looked so interesting and a lot of people were saying it was the funniest film of the year. Now obviously humor is subjective but I personally found this one pretty funny. It's a well-made movie for everything it's got.

I feel like labeling this movie as a once-in-a-lifetime movie, along the same lines as the LOTR trilogy, Boyhood, and Everything Everywhere All At Once, for example. It must have been since Charlie Chaplin died that we've had a brilliant silent black-and-white movie like this one, and I'm not sure we'll see another. It's very rare to find something that can be both silly and hilarious, if that makes any sense. Just about every choice for this movie really does enhance the overall experience. The editing isn't smooth but I think that helps add to the silliness of the premise. You can tell it's just an actor running in place for example, and that's a good thing. The visual gags surprisingly never get old, combining all-too familiar visual gags with some brand new, more modern gags. It manages in a very good way of keeping a nostalgic and familiar feel while appealing to more modern audiences, and even the modern stuff I feel is going to take a very long time if at all to be outdated. There is character development and you cheer for the character to succeed, and there is spectacular setup and payoff for everything involved.

A couple things held it back from being a 10/10. I feel like the beginning wasn't executed as well as the ending in terms of comedic value, but I will say that does make the movie better and better as it goes along, which many movies are unable to accomplish. There were a couple of messy camera shots that really just left me confused (I'm thinking of the wolf attack) and had me just wondering what happened instead of the clarity of the story from the majority of the shots. A couple of the editing choices were questionable during the final action sequence but were otherwise very fitting and expertly crafted. These are honestly pretty minor things and I may change my rating to a 10 later on. My ratings not going down from here I can tell you that.

I have to say this movie is very impressive considering not many comedies these days can actually work at making you laugh. This is the highest rated comedy film that I can find on imdb after some Charlie Chaplin movies. And it has a reported budget of only $150,000???? That's insane. We're talking ONE THOUSAND TIMES LESS money than a typical Hollywood big blockbuster movie. Apparently they only had enough budget money to afford FIVE beaver suits to be used over and over again for this film. And it's still a better movie than 90% of Hollywood movies today. 100s of recommendations (see what I did there haha) for this movie; absolutely go check it out and support it.

I didn't see a parent guide for this film so I thought I'd add one so parents can decide if they want their children watching it. There is a tad bit of gore but it's black not red, and there is some impaling and other intense stuff, but those sections are very cartoony and not gory. There are also some sexual gags (objects shaped like breasts and a penis specifically; this stuff may go over some children's heads) and there is one sequence that lasts about 30 seconds of a woman pole dancing (she is clothed while doing it). Alcohol and tobacco references exist but I think that's about it; hope I gave a good overview for that.

This is probably one of the most creative bits of home brew filmmaking I've seen in quite a while.

Incredibly creative and funny. Wonderful gags from start to finish.

Unfortunately the film's greatest strength can also be its greatest weakness at times.

The choice to have no dialogue is fun, but it denies the opportunity for the film to slow down at any point. This results in the experience being a little exhausting.

Jokes that should be funny whiz by at times, since the brain is so overstimulated.

The non-stop, rapid fire pace can be greatly appreciated in short bursts, but if you hold down the trigger the barrel is going to overheat.

Still, greatly appreciated this movie. Plenty of laugh out loud moments. I have a soft spot in my heart for films like this where it's clear the people involved have a lot of passion and love for movies.

Highly recommend, probably going to check out "Lake Michigan Monster" next.

Cheers!

This film was excellent for the first half hour. The premise the look of the film, and also the comedic timing was spot on. I commend all of the filmmakers for the do it yourself style.

The only in major issue with it is it's way too long. There isn't a world where this film needed to be two hours long. If it was 80 minutes and a little faster paced in the middle this would have a very higher score.

But the cinematography and the editing was excellent. Wes Anderson would be proud. I'm excited to see what this filmmaker does with his next project which I hope is a little more focused and tight.