Movie of the Week: HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS (Mike Cheslik, 2022)

When was the last time you saw something you’ve never seen before?

Hundreds of Beavers is many things. It’s a goofy homage to slapstick comedy, an ingenious fusion of live-action and animation, and — with its open-world environment dictated by strict rules — a video game. At one point, it even morphs into an Expressionist courtroom drama, before reconfiguring into Godzilla for its final, awe-inspiring set piece. That Mike Cheslik and Ryland Brickson Cole Tews (a name straight from the 19th-century snowscape that serves as the movie’s setting) make this all work is testament to the integrity and novelty of their vision. But what especially endears Hundreds of Beavers to me is its humble origins in my home state of Wisconsin. Cheslik and Tews met at Whitefish Bay High School — a place to which I traveled twice for forensics tournaments — and continued collaborating into adulthood. The idea for Beavers came to them at a bar in Milwaukee, which checks out incredibly hard once you’ve seen it. That’s not to suggest that the movie is all quirky style and lowbrow shtick: There’s something real and painful here about the inherent violence of capitalism. Jean Kayak (Tews) is a drunk whose blunders have destroyed his initial livelihood as an applejack salesman. Out in the frozen wilderness with no food, he bonks and boinks his way to his meals, then eventually gets swept into the fur-trapping trade — committing to it wholeheartedly once he lays eyes on the fluttering lashes of the fur merchant’s daughter. For in the harsh world of Beavers, the only way into the heart of a fair maiden is to kill as many rodents as humanly possible. It’s also the only real path to prosperity. The rodents, however, have their own cunning ways of biting back, and the ensuing flurry of limbs, tools, and Rube Goldberg hijinks produces some of the most original American cinema in ages. It was the movie everyone was talking about when I was at the 2023 Wisconsin Film Festival with a short, and the fact that I missed it with the home crowd will haunt me now. One ticket to whatever’s next, so long as Cheslik — who has signed with WME — can resist studio fare that vanishes his unmistakably Midwestern voice.

Streaming on Prime Video; available for rent on Apple, Amazon, and other major platforms.