reivew (c)1998 eric lurio
The Castle
directed by Rob Sitch
This is, in a way, payback. There have been lots of movies based on TV shows recently, not all that many of them have been particularly good, and yet they have been exported to many countries that have not been subjected to the original TV shows.
Are they comprehensible? Do they make any sense as cinema on their own? Does the `Coneheads' movie, for example, stand on it's own if you're not a fan of the old series of skits?
Well, what if some other country decided to dump one of IT's TV spinoffs on our shores? How would it fare? Would we understand it?
`Frontline' is an Australian TV show. It's basically a satire of current- events shows. `Weekend Update' writ large. It's reportedly very popular down under and the spin-off feature did wonderfully at the box office.
It's called `The Castle.'
It begins with an introduction `I'm Dale Kerrigan(Stephen Curry) and this is my story.'
We are then introduced to the family father Daryl(Michael Caton), mum Sal(Anne Tenney), brother Steve(Anthony Simcoe) and sister Tracy(Sophie Lee) [another brotherWayne(Wayne Hope) is, of course, in jail]. In typical Saturday Night Live fashion, they are all complete morons.
The Kerrigan clan live right next to the airport. About ten feet away. They love their house. They love each other. They are the happiest family in Austraila, if not the entire southern hemisphere. It's revolting!
So of course some bad men have to spoil all this bliss! In this case, the airport decides to condemn the land on which they live in order to expand the airport.
And we are treated to a lesson in how the Aussies protect their rights....
Since Dad is a moron, his lawyer has to be one too. Dennis Denuto(Tiriel Mora) isn't the densist soliciter in Oz, but he's close. The neighbors are also dumb, and if it wasn't for a deux-ex-machina in the form of Lawrence Hammill (Charles 'Bud' Tingwell), an extremly emminant lawyer.
The humor grates a bit, but on the whole, it is tolerable.
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