Oddball is a 2015 Australian family movie directed by Stuart McDonald.
Set in the small town of Warrnambool in southwest Victoria, Emily Marsh (Sarah Snook) works to preserve a dwindling colony of little penguins in the nearby Middle Island. The efforts to stave off predators keep failing and make Emily consider giving up and moving to America with her young daughter Olivia (Coco Jack Gillies) and boyfriend Bradley Slater (Alan Tudyk). However, Olivia and her eccentric farmer grandfather Swampy (Shane Jacobson) discover that not all hope is lost when Swampy's mischievous Maremma sheepdog Oddball shows an interest in guarding the penguins.
Tropes:
- Based on a True Story: The movie is based on the real-life Maremma Project, in which Maremma sheepdogs are used to protect Middle Island's penguin colony from foxes and other predators. The project started in 2006 and has succeeded in helping to replenish the penguin population.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Swampy thinks Oddball is a poor shepherd dog since he has no interest in guarding the chickens he's been put in charge of and tends to do whatever he wants. Swampy is thus very surprised when Oddball shows himself to be extremely competent at guarding penguins (most likely, Oddball doesn't care about the chickens because there's already another Maremma at the farm).
- Diabolical Dog Catcher: The dog-catcher seems to have a personal enmity with Oddball (not entirely unwarranted as Oddball sometimes runs amok and causes property damage in the town) and is gleeful at the prospect of catching him to put him down.
- Evil All Along: Emily's co-worker Zoe turns out to be sabotaging the preservation efforts so her boyfriend can build his whale-watching station and she can leave her job, which she hates.
- Training Montage: Swampy and Olivia try various ways of training Oddball to be a good sheepdog to the penguins, which are shown as a montage set to diegetic opera music (meant to inspire Oddball as the Maremma is an Italian breed).
