Wits End
1952 · 10m · Canada
Directed by Roger Blais, Douglas Tunstell
Tones: humorous, theatrical
A comedy variety film presents Jane Mallet as a physical fitness enthusiast called Nature Woman, a musical performance by the Commodores, and a skit built around a radio agony aunt fielding her listeners' personal problems.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
It's a variety show, which is basically the opposite of subversive—three unrelated sketches stitched together with no connective tissue beyond 'we had a budget.' The radio agony aunt bit has potential bite, but it's buried under vaudeville earnestness and a musical number that feels like filler.
A textbook example of the NFB's mid-century variety format—three discrete acts that reveal the studio's commitment to comedic structure and the physical grammar of live performance translated to film. The agony aunt segment particularly demonstrates how formal constraint (the radio booth, the intimate advice column) creates dramatic shape.
The decision to frame an entire sketch around the mechanical predictability of radio advice—fielding problems through a static microphone setup—creates unexpected intimacy in what could've been broad slapstick. That formal choice, more than the gags themselves, is what makes this hold together.