The Castle

Darryl Kerrigan lives with his wife Sal and their children in a modest house they built themselves on the outskirts of Melbourne, right beside the flight path of Tullamarine Airport. The planes overhead bother them not at all; the home is their pride, filled with homemade extensions and treasured details. Their contentment ends when a building inspector condemns the structure and the authorities move to acquire the land for an airport expansion. Rather than accept the offer, Darryl hires a struggling lawyer, Dennis Denuto, and takes on the government to keep the house the family loves.

The Castle is an Australian comedy-drama directed by Rob Sitch, who wrote it with Tom Gleisner and Jane Kennedy and made his feature directing debut with it. He followed it with The Dish in 2000. Michael Caton plays Darryl, with Anne Tenney as Sal, Stephen Curry as Dale, Anthony Simcoe as Steve, Sophie Lee as Tracy and Wayne Hope as Wayne, among a credited cast of 42 and crew of 43. Released in April 1997 and running 85 minutes, the film draws on the family's determination as the basis for its humour.

On IMDb it holds 7.7 out of 10 from about 19,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.1 from some 240 votes. A film critics' rating of 7.2 from 38 reviews places it close to those audience scores, indicating broad agreement among reviewers and viewers.