Few words should strike fear into the hearts of American moviegoers like the phrase "feel-good Australian comedy," but now that The Full Monty has sparked an insatiable desire to see more of the world's quirky underclass, 1997's painfully strident The Castle has been dusted off and released to theaters. A sort of benign Pink Flamingos ladled with a thin broth of Capra-esque uplift, the film champions a tacky, stupidly optimistic family which fights to save its home from government eviction. As the patriarch of his cluttered "castle," Michael Caton has a knack for putting a positive spin on every hardship: The roaring planes at an adjacent airport are outweighed by the convenience of living so close to it, the giant power lines overhead are a testament to man's ability to generate electricity, and his wife's sponge cake is nothing short of a revelation. It wouldn't be such a bad joke, really, were it not stretched so far beyond the limits of patience and credibility. Director Rob Sitch wants to poke gentle fun at Caton and his family while extolling their simple virtues, but he's unwilling to grant them the simple dignity of common sense. When his two-bit lawyer (Tiriel Mora) makes a fool of himself in federal court, Caton is so oblivious to his plainly incompetent performance that he can hardly fathom the resulting verdict. The Castle is brimming with such absurdly contrived moments, tempered only by the most condescending shows of affection. Sitch perches himself too comfortably above his characters to pass for an Aussie answer to John Waters, a director who understands better than anyone that you can't laugh at white trash without getting dirty.