For the IndieWeb Movie Club I watched 1997’s The Castle
IWC April 2025: hosted by Zachary Kai
Usually I will read and research before seeing a film. I don’t mind spoilers. So a trailer and a wikipedia synopsis would be a first step. For this, I took it on faith that it’d be worthwhile. The Castle was introduced by Zachary with this short synopsis:
It’s about the value of family, home, and standing up for what you believe in: told with quintessential Australian humor.
I had a slight worry that quintessentially-Australianness might lose me.
And indeed, the tone at the start seemed less than charitable to the characters. I couldn’t quite sort out whether the movie was punching down at regular people with mundane lives or whether the film was rooting for them. It establishes a rhythm to their lines: meals, inventions, home improvement, airplanes landing nearby. Fine, but not particularly dramatic, maybe even dull.
But then powerful interests threaten to evict Darryl & his family–and some several neighbors too. He’s going to lose his Castle. At that point I was in. Underdog stories are a favorite of mine. I was charmed and chuckling.
It was fun to see Eric Bana before he became famous as a genre/action/sci-fi/superhero genre player. And I recognized Sophie Lee as a terrific supporting actor from Muriel’s Wedding–another Australian underdog tale from the 1990s.
There’s a scene where Darryl is chatting with a random fellow outside a courthouse that reminded of my grandfather. He too was guileless and friendly–willing to share his story and compliment a stranger’s kid and wish them the best. That essential goodness and openness grounds the story so the both the comic situation and dramatic conflict manage to land.
And special mention to the way the word “vibes” is used in a legal context.
I enjoyed the film! Thanks Zachary for this choice!
Last Thought
Some media are so of their country culturally that they don’t hit my heart. Dr. Who is the example I think of most. I can tell it has the parts I enjoy, science fiction, jokes, high drama. But there’s a Britishness that I know puts me at a remove from it. I can feel the shearing layers between me and it. It’s not it, it’s me. The Castle has cultural specificity, manages to make it a feature not a bug.
