An endearing comedy, The Beaver is a great take on a somewhat dark subject matter...

Having not directed since 1995's Home For The Holidays and 1991's Little Man Tate, Jodie Foster returns with a screenplay from a relatively new writer and backing from Steve Golin. Producer and founder of Propaganda Films, Golin is responsible for quirky, out-of-the-box films such as Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, so the perfect man for The Beaver's eccentricities.

An introductory cockney voice-over tells us what we're looking at is a “picture of Walter Black – a hopelessly depressed individual” who no longer has any coping mechanisms. A once dynamic family man and creative business man at toy company JerryCo, Walter self-prescribes “puppet therapy” after finding a discarded beaver puppet and surviving a disastrous suicide attempt. Having already been forced by his wife, Meredith, to move out of the family home, Walter uses the puppet to try to create “a distance between [himself] and [his] negative psychological aspects”.

An architect designing roller-coasters, Meredith is initially willing to try anything to get her husband back and is at first astounded by the speed at which the old Walter seems to be returning. Work colleagues and staff are forced to ignore their scepticism when the beaver puppet and his youngest son inspire a bestselling children's toolkit but Walter's oldest, Porter, is ashamed of his father's new “friend”. Eventually it's up to Walter to decide whether his family are enough support or whether the beaver's still his missing link.

Initially a skilfully scripted tragi-comedy, The Beaver begins with a light-hearted montage illustrating Walter's varied attempts to reignite himself - self-flagellation, drumming sessions, self-help books, hypnosis...it's all there. Furthermore, despite being disgusted by his father's demise, Porter's post-it note wall marks a number of similarities to his father is another source of humour, alongside cutesy lines from Walter's youngest. The failed suicide attempt that opens the film is also darkly comical as we watch the shower rail snap and Walter wander around with a shower curtain trailing behind him.

The surreal introduction of the beaver puppet is naturally another source of marginally uncomfortable guilty comedy. We're privy to shots of Walter running and showering with the beaver puppet and even brushing its “teeth” and blow drying its fur. Love-making scenes involving an in-sync panting beaver are particularly inspired. And of course writer - Kyle Killen - doesn't waste the opportunity to have an array of beaver-related miniature props and an internal fight scene.

Killen's script is beautifully pitched, allowing us to share in the surreal situation Walter's family find themselves in as they muddle through their ordeal. Opening descriptions of Walter's state are almost lyrical (“Walter's depression is an ink staining everything it touches”) while occasional lines from the beaver are priceless: “Rest up you delicious little tart – there's more where that came from”. As Killen allows the puppet to take control, he makes the beaver more egocentric: “I'm not a puppet – I'm real, I'm alive and the world needs to know” and provides a lexically neat circular ending.

Although Gibson arguably plays a rendition of himself, he visibly musters all of his acting skills to avoid laughing when delivering lines as the beaver. A poor ventriloquist he may be, but a lively beaver he makes. Simultaneously communicating the comedy and tragedy of Walter's situation, as the beaver Walter has a mesmerising speaking voice and electric personality. It's never quite clear whether our beaver friend is a cockney or Aussie, prompting some interesting questions regarding his providence. A restaurant anniversary scene is slightly bizarre and shots of Walter with booze dominated groceries are a tad clichéd but Foster directs well, managing to humanely find the funny side of a highly emotional situation.

Knowing full well how preposterous the film's premise is Foster manages to extract strong performances from her entire cast.  This brave fascinating oddity is full of strange twists and turns as family dynamics and generational parallels are explored in this oddball family drama.

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