A Case of Eggs: Episode 1
1974 · 15m · Canada
Directed by Bernard Devlin
Genres: comedy, mystery, satire
Tones: absurdist, humorous, whimsical
Detectives Frances and Rita are hired to look into a scientist's odd behaviour while a farmer frets over striking hens. A lovelorn student drifts through the comic mystery.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A 1974 Canadian comedy-mystery where the actual plot—detectives, a scientist, striking hens—is almost beside the point; what matters is that Devlin commits absolutely to the absurdist logic and lets the lovelorn student meander through it like he's in a different film entirely, which is exactly the kind of tonal confidence that makes people uncomfortable.
Devlin's episode structure and whimsical tone situate this within a lineage of experimental comedy-mystery shorts that resists neat categorization; the formal restraint in how the multiple threads—detective work, agricultural crisis, romantic drift—are woven together shows a precise understanding of comic timing and narrative architecture.
The masterstroke here is casting the lovelorn student as the film's emotional anchor in what could've been a pure sketch—one performance choice that transforms a series of absurdist gags into something that actually lands because we *care* about his displacement amid the chaos.