A Foot And A Half A Second

Hither comes 2025, and another twelve months of films that will see us cross 450 reviews, and reach our ninth anniversary. Where better place to start this year than Hundreds of Beavers , a nigh-silent, black and white film made for $150,000, by Mike Cheslik, the director of the equally fantastic, and even more-shoestring riding Lake Michigan Monster. Hundreds of Beavers is a film with spirit, a wry sense of humour, its 1920s and 1930s influences on its sleeve and as many laughs as it has castorine menaces, as our taciturn hero, Jean Kayak (co-writer Ryland Brickson Cole Tews), attempts to eradicate the titular beavers to win the hand of the daughter of a supply store owner, in what may be one of the most remarkable, most ridiculous, and most charming films of this decade. Kayak is, when we meet him, a successful apple-grower, and cider maker and seller in the 19th Century American frontier. This idyll, brought to us through song (much of the score is by Tews' father, Wayne Tews,...