This is a breath of fresh air and it rattles along at a zippy pace with change from an hour and a half, just as every good comedy should.
Orange County (2002)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:120
Fresh:56
Rotten:64
Average Rating:5.2/10
Consensus: Smarter than the average teen movie, but a little on the unmemorable side.
Runtime: 82 mins
Genre: Comedies
US Box Office: $41,032,915
Synopsis: ORANGE COUNTY is a teen comedy that, along with goofy lowbrow fun, offers a surprising amount of wit and heart. Colin Hanks (son of Tom Hanks) stars as Shaun, a carefree California surfer dude who... ORANGE COUNTY is a teen comedy that, along with goofy lowbrow fun, offers a surprising amount of wit and heart. Colin Hanks (son of Tom Hanks) stars as Shaun, a carefree California surfer dude who loses a friend to a tsunami. Shaun is contemplating his life when he finds a brilliant novel buried in the sand. He reads it and decides to become a writer himself, and study with the author, who teaches at Stanford. He's eager to leave Orange County, where he lives with his clingy alcoholic mother (Catherine O'Hara) and his burnout brother Lance (a brilliantly debauched Jack Black). When Shaun's guidance counselor (Lily Tomlin) sends the wrong transcript to Stanford, Shaun needs all the help he can get from his seemingly hopeless family to salvage his dream. ORANGE COUNTY was directed by Jake Kasdan (Lawrence Kasdan's son) and written by Mike White (CHUCK & BUCK) who also plays Shaun's illiterate English teacher. Schuyler Fisk (Sissy Spacek's daughter) plays Ashley, Shaun's animal-loving girlfriend, and she and Hanks make an attractive and sympathetic pair. While all kinds of insanity (including hilarious turns by Black, O'Hara, and Harold Ramis) spins around them, the young and dynamic couple remain the soulful center of the film. [More]
Starring: Colin Hanks, Jack Black, Leslie Mann, Schulyer Fisk
Starring: Colin Hanks, Jack Black, Leslie Mann, Schulyer Fisk, Lizzy Caplan, Catherine O'Hara, John Lithgow, Lily Tomlin, Chevy Chase, Harold Ramis, Kevin Kline, Ben Stiller
Director: Jake Kasdan
Director: Jake Kasdan
Screenwriter: Mike White
Producer: Scott Rudin, Van Toffler, David Gale, Herb Gains, Adam Schroeder
Composer: Michael Andrews
Producer: Scott Aversano
Studio: Paramount Pictures
Reviews for Orange County
Despite some good intentions and a decent coming-of-age story, Orange County is sadly bogged down by lackluster jokes, poorly utilized celebrity cameos galore and decent if uninvolving leads.
It won't stick with you forever, but you will enjoy it while it lasts.
Second-generation Hollywood wrestles with but never truly pins down this big-hearted, broad and often flat comedy...
[Kasdan] and White aim very low here and fail to take advantage of the abundant opportunities for social satire that its upper class and academic settings provide.
With minimal gross-out quota, Kasdan's sure-footed approach mixes a teen farce and a morality tale.
The urine-quaffing gags and hearty barfing asides are the lowbrow price extracted for...gestures towards semi-intelligence.
If all you're looking for is a mild comedy with four or five solid laughs and a whole bunch of familiar faces, you could do worse.
É claro que os pais famosos do diretor e dos dois protagonistas ajudaram a viabilizar este projeto, mas o fato é que o filme é engraçado e merece aplausos.
The sight of Black burning down an entire admin block during a moment of passion would warm up any winter.
It is a notch above the usual tripe we get from MTV films - but it's not a very big notch
Refreshingly, it's not as lowbrow or silly as your typical youth-oriented comedy of late.
Engages us in constant fits of laughter, until we find ourselves surprised at how much we care about the story, and end up walking out not only satisfied but also somewhat touched.
This is mostly weak stuff, with a timid and reactionary final message about how it's better to stay in your home town, rather than go for a big-city college education.
Though there are no real belly laughs or any Farrelly-like set pieces, this is still a better than average comedy, thanks to its witty script and its amusing collection of characters.
Latest News for Orange County
August 31, 2006:
ThinkFilm Turns On "The TV Set"
Interested in a comedy that takes a no-prisoners, warts-and-all approach to network television production? How about if I told you it came from Jake Kasdan, son of high-quality... More...
December 16, 2005:
It Couldn't Happen to a Nicer Virgin
The surprise sleeper hit "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" just barely cracked the century mark at the domestic box office, which is pretty impressive for a movie star-less sex... More...
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