When Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the Moon on 20 July 1969, he was watched by a global TV audience of 600 million people. But how many of them had even heard of Parkes, the town in New South Wales, Australia, whose radio telescope transmitted the pictures? Not many, and that's the arresting premise of this gentle comedy drama from the people who made The Castle in 1997. Based on a true story, this heart-warming film shows small-town folk getting on with the business of making history. In American hands it might have been a strident flag-waver, but that's not the Australian way. Instead, it's full of self-deprecating, irreverent Aussie humour, typified by Roy Billing's local mayor (who might have been a puffed-up oaf in a less subtle comedy) and Tayler Kane's security guard, Rudi, who takes his job very seriously indeed, although the likelihood of a breach by anything other than sheep is as remote as Parkes itself. Sam Neill supplies a dignified authority - and a star name, of course - but this is unique and smart enough not to need one.

A group of maverick scientists on a remote Australian sheep farm are the globe's only hope for obtaining the epic images of man's first steps on the moon.