As an aspiring writer, I was intrigued by the synopsis of the new film “Orange County.” Tom Hanks’s son Collin Hanks plays Sean, a surfer turned aspiring writer at Orange County High School. Sean decided not to be a surfer after finding a book on the beach written by a professor at Stanford.
Sean convinces himself that Orange County is not the best environment for an aspiring writer, so he sets his mind on Stanford to study with the writer whose book he found on the beach.
Sean is assured that he is a shoe-in, and when there is a mishap by the guidance counselor, he is, as predicted, not accepted.
Sean’s brother played by the always hilarious Jack Black, suggests a road trip to Stanford. Does Sean get into Stanford? Does he become a writer, and is he happy? These are questions that Mike White, the writer of the film, probably wanted you as the viewer to ponder but in reality you don’t care.
“Orange County” is an MTV production and maybe the company’s worst movie since “Joe’s Apartment.”
The upsides to the movie are two-fold: first is the terrific acting of Collin Hanks, who does a wonderful job with such a lousy script, and second is the ensemble of great actors that included the comedy of Jack Black and John Lithgow, as well as cameos from Chevy Chase and Kevin Klein.
The downsides to the movie are many, first of which being the unoriginality of it. It was a cross between a poor “Finding Forrester,” with the young writer searching for inspiration in his life and a garden-variety teen movie with the bad clich characters and typical one-liners. The funny parts are few and far between, and the seriousness is undermined by the stupidity of the choice of references.
If you are planning on watching “Orange County,” prepare yourself for typical references to literary figures such as Faulkner and Joyce, with no weight behind the use of their names.
To top it off, the movie has a lousy soundtrack full of songs popular months ago. The only part that did surprise me about “Orange County” was that Tom Hanks was not in it. I guess money can’t buy everyone.