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Why would anyone think the concept for Orange County staring Colin Hanks as the overachieving student Shaun Brumder be material for an entertaining movie, because it surely wasn’t. Now if the name Hanks sounds familiar yes, Colin is the son of Tom Hanks (Cast Away) and if you close your eyes the voice is almost the same. This is where the similarity ends. I doubt we could judge one’s acting ability by the screeching tantrums of a teenager having one crisis after another, but gee how hard can it be to recreate your teenage years for a paycheck. The plot of this film is absurd, the acting tedious, lots of predictability and if I ever have to see the crack of Jack Black’s ass (Shallow Hal) again I will scream. The only thing remotely interesting in this film directed by Jake Kasdan was the quantity of stars with cameos in this ridiculous movie. We have Ben Stiller (There’s Something About Mary) as a fireman for all of 10 seconds. The reason for Hanks inspiration as a writer is Kevin Kline (Life as a House) as Stanford professor and author Marcus Skinner and Garry Marshall as a member of the board of Stanford. Chevy Chase appears as Hanks’ principal but the performance is easily forgotten and so is Lily Tomlin’s as the dim-witted college guidance counselor. The setting is Orange County, duh. The name and the plot are both simple, the overachiever and class president Hanks has an epiphany after the death of a friend in an inane surfing accident. He finds a book in the sand, written by a Stanford professor and decides to become a writer and attend Stanford. Hanks gives up his board and devotes his time to his writing. His girlfriend Ashley (Schuyler Fisk) is a bleeding heart animal lover and seems to be the only person who believes in his writing, whereas loser, drug using brother Lance (Black) actually pukes on Hanks novella and I mean actually pukes on it. All the morons in the school get into Stanford except Hanks and it turns out the guidance counselor sent the wrong transcripts. Hanks go to his dad (John Lithgow of Shrek) who left the family for a twenty-year-old slut and asks for his help. We get to see another tantrum as he storms out. Hanks’ girlfriend blackmails her sluttish friend because her grandfather is on the board for Stanford and they show up to his house to meet him. Not the best of idea’s because his drunk mother, Catherine O’Hara (Home Fries) is running her mouth again and the strung out brother Lance pays a visit in those nasty not so tidy whiteys. Now that was sick, but oh it gets better. This container of pee is on the end table just waiting for someone to pick it up and drink, and as predicable as it was, thank goodness it was just spilled everywhere instead. With his last chance at Stanford sabotaged, Hanks, his girlfriend and his brother head for Stanford to convince the dean to let him in. A little bit of sex, a fire, and a lot of drugs later and we finally have reached the end of this film. I guess you can guess what kind of rating Orange County gets from me. I don’t believe I found anything to be the slightest bit funny. In fact if there was even a possibility for humor it was ruined by trying too hard and being so obvious. This film was like banging your head against the wall until eventually it becomes numb and monotonous. I give Orange County a three on the About-Movies.com couch scale. Kowabunga dudes
Last updated: Thursday, March 20, 2008 02:48:23 AM Click Here to get back into frames.
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