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Orange County
Paramount Pictures

Orange County reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 48 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
7.6 out of 10
based on 28 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 20 votes
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MPAA RATING: PG-13 for drug content, language and sexuality

Starring Colin Hanks, Schuyler Fisk, Catherine O'Hara, Jack Black, John Lithgow, Lily Tomlin, and Harold Ramis

When his guidance counselor accidentally sends the wrong transcript with his application to Stanford, a smart high school senior (Hanks) must scramble to prove he deserves to be admitted.


GENRE(S): Comedy  
WRITTEN BY: Mike White  
DIRECTED BY: Jake Kasdan  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: June 18, 2002 
Video: June 18, 2002 
Theatrical: January 11, 2002 
RUNNING TIME: 81 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

83
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
Arriving amid the traditionally withered harvest of January releases, Orange County is peachy.
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80
Rolling Stone Peter Travers
It's the new year's first happy surprise.
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75
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
The movie is hipper than its L.A. establishment credentials would suggest.
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75
Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
It's one of those movies like "Ghost World" and "Legally Blonde" where the description can't do justice to the experience.
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70
LA Weekly Manohla Dargis
This genial comedy is as unambitious and, at times, as funny as its high concept.
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63
Miami Herald Charles Savage
Even if the whole of Orange County is less than the sum of its parts, Jack Black is not the only thing to like about this movie.
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63
Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
Delivers an unexpected sweetness.
60
Variety Todd McCarthy
A fine group of comic performers manages to keep the screen worth looking at despite the obsessively one-note nature of this curious matchup between MTV Films and producer Scott Rudin.
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60
Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas
Starts out deliriously funny but allows sentimentality to squeeze it to a pulp by the time it's over.
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60
Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
A feebly pleasant surprise: It's not as cheap, loud and sleazy as it might have been, but it's also too eagerly well-meaning and indistinct to really stick. It's a piece of mildly entertaining, inoffensive fluff.
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60
Film Threat Michael Dequina
Not only harmless, but actually quite funny and charming.
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50
USA Today Mike Clark
Every performer puts vigor into an otherwise limp exercise, as if word were out that this would be the last comedy ever made about late-adolescent concerns.
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50
New York Daily News Jami Bernard
Under different direction, Orange County might have drawn a savvy cult audience that would appreciate the black-comedy possibilities of Shaun's idolatry of a certain writing professor (Kline), the homoerotic overtones inherent in best-buddydom and pyromania as a sexual turn-on.
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50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen
This is a picture with a perfect sense of proportion: There's a mini-Hanks, a mini-Spacek and a mini-Kasdan in a mini-comedy that's minimally entertaining.
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50
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
An almost successful comedy.
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50
Village Voice Michael Atkinson
Hardly the idiosyncratic Mickey Finn you'd expect from the men behind 1998's underrated "Zero Effect" and 2000's discomfort-splooge "Chuck & Buck."
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50
ReelViews James Berardinelli
Were it not for the high profile names of "Hanks" and "Kasdan", this would be a perfect candidate for a direct-to-video release.
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50
The New York Times Dana Stevens
The gags and subplots, rather than adding up to sustained hilarity, compete with each other.
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50
Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
For my money, what keeps it bearable is mainly the mugging of the older folks -- not just Jack Black, who steals the show in a part seemingly inspired by John Belushi, but Catherine O'Hara, John Lithgow, and cameos by Chevy Chase, Lily Tomlin, and Kevin Kline.
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40
The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin
Ultimately it lacks even the conviction of its own nastiness.
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40
TV Guide Frank Lovece
This ORANGE is a lemon.
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40
Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
It's a movie at war with itself. The first half, more or less, is witty about California culture, or the lack of it, in a "Clueless" kind of way, which is a very good way.
38
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
Flat as a Moravian cookie, flat as a sailor's wallet after a month in port, flat as the average European's impression of the Earth in A.D. 800.
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38
New York Post Jonathan Foreman
In any case, the presence of O'Hara, Kline, Ramis, Black, Tomlin and John Lithgow (who plays Shaun's father) serve mainly to underline the feebleness of the screenplay and the slackness of the direction.
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38
Chicago Tribune Robert K. Elder
Black delivers the best line (“Do you want me to get naked and start the revolution?”), and Lithgow scores a giggle for calling his ex-wife “coyote ugly” to her face, but neither of them can disguise this lemon.
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30
Washington Post Rita Kempley
Strictly a vanity vehicle with a mess of star babies on board. That would be just fine if it didn't take us down the same old cul-de-sac. But it does, and with a vengeance.
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25
Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
It should have been a cut above the usual teen comedy. But it touches the same old bases in the same old dumb ways.
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20
Washington Post Desson Thomson
The movie is less than nothing special. The movie veers between pretentiousness (oh, the plight of the instant, start-up Artist) and vacuousness.
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What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 7.6 (out of 10) based on 20 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Tom L gave it a7:
Orange County is a movie about a kid trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life. After the passing of one of his friends he abandons his old easy going surfer life style stereo typical of where he is from (orange county) and dedicates his life to writing. His goal was to go to Stanford and escape the dysfunctional home and town he grew up in. The movie starts out kind of stupid, but Jack Black was kind of funny in his same old roll as a fat crazy guy. The main character and his crazy day sort of reminded me of a mix of the catcher in the rye and Ferris Bueller's day off. For some reason I just enjoyed watching the movie and it seemed like a good length, with a good beginning, middle, and end.

Jack H. gave it an8:
Jack Black saved this movie! One of his best roles ever. So many classic quotes, such as "She said, I'm gonna burn this mother down! And I'm like, you better not, you, you better not!,".

Dave C. gave it a 5:
Jack Black is the film's saving grace. He is able to deliver some of the most unsubtle lines like "you banged mom?" with such perfect comic timing, that it could hve you rolling over the floor laughing. The film's story about staying true to your roots is never particular interesting and the film's themes are unfortunately delivered with the same lack of subtlety as the humour, leaving a film that feels stale and obvious.

raVen gave it a 3:
Finally! A movie that makes it okay for Southern California's rich kids to pull themselves out from under the combined weights of wealth, easy living, and drugged-out drunken relatives to live their dreams! Whatever the hell that's worth. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate what this movie kept TRYING to say. But what it really ended up saying to me is that I too could achieve my wildest dreams if I didn't have to worry about paying my own tuition, going to work, or having relationships with actual human beings. This is the sort of movie the UN would get a kick out of watching the next time we turn down a request for foreign aid. I have no doubt there are people in this country (many of them in Orange County) who live in such a remote fantasy land. But I guarantee that for the rest of us, when we make the sacrifice to follow our dreams, the second choice won't be a career at Stanford--or anything like it. Then again, it makes things like love and friendship all the more urgent. This movie wasn't made for people like me, so forgive my not being moved by it. 3 for the good intentions--wherever they went.

Laura P. gave it a 10:
I loved Colin Hanks in this movie!! I thought he did a really good job in it!!! :)

Cool Guy gave it a 10:
This is one of the best movies I saw, quite cool!

Paul D. gave it a 7:
Somewhat scattershot and lamebrained, but still funny and entertaining. It's also charming and a very good video rental.

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