3. A silent or dialogue-free film: Hundreds of Beavers (2022)

List Progress: 10/12

Slapstick is hard. Good slapstick is very hard. Keeping an audience engaged with physical comedy, especially without dialogue, is a huge feat, and when it goes poorly it lands with a heavy thud. Thankfully, the 2022 film Hundreds of Beavers succeeds at this task with aplomb. A combination of deft plotting, well-executed physical comedy, quick editing and inventive animations to fill the gaps make for a great slapstick film, which manages not to drag even at feature length.

Clearly framed after black and white comedies of the 1920’s, Hundreds of Beavers follows a would-be fur trapper, left destitute after beavers lead to the destruction of his applejack business. His troubles unfold like a video game, as he first just tries to survive in the icy forests, then trade supplies for better upgrades, then try to charm the daughter of a local merchant while going to war with various woodland creatures. Performer Ryland Brickson Cole Tews, who co-wrote the film with Mike Cheslik, is as much a real life cartoon as the animations flitting around him, all big expressions and full-body reactions. Along with the central clown and the animations, the various forest creatures are portrayed with human performers wearing huge, obvious mascot costumes that only symbolically look like animals. This is a film that will always sacrifice realism for the sake of a joke, and it is all the better for it. Whether it’s a simple gag like the merchant always missing his spitoon, or a long runner like a pair of beaver detectives investigating the confusing deaths of local wildlife, each set-up and joke is crafted beautifully and deployed at just the right time.

The film does have a dark sense of humor, even without words at its disposal, and not all audiences will be as delighted to see fuzzy critters and a lonely man in a brutal fight to the death. But for those willing to go along for the ride, this is a hilarious piece of comedic filmmaking.

Would I Recommend It: Yes.