Orange County (2002) * * *

Directed by:  Jake Kasdan

Starring:  Colin Hanks, Schuyler Fisk, Jack Black, John Lithgow, Catherine O' Hara, Harold Ramis, Kevin Kline, Lily Tomlin, Chevy Chase, Leslie Mann

Shaun Brumder (Hanks) makes a life-changing decision one day while hanging at the beach in sunny Orange County, California.   He discovers a book buried in the sand which causes him to immediately scrap his surfer dude lifestyle and get serious about becoming a writer.     The writer of the book is Marcus Skinner, whom Shaun learns is a professor at Stanford University, and thus Shaun makes it his life's mission to get into Stanford to meet his idol.    His family and friends, unintentionally, do not make this easy for him.     Orange County is the affable, breezy film about Shaun's quest, which encounters obstacles because he trusts his goofball, couch potato half-brother Lance (Black) to help him out.    He would've been better leaving Lance home, but the movie would not have been as funny.

Shaun's loved ones mean well.   They really do.    They try to help, but can't stay out of their own way.    If these people were malevolent, selfish jerks, then the movie might've been intolerable, but they, just as Shaun and his girlfriend Ashley (Fisk), are sweet and well-meaning.     Ashley is fully aware Shaun getting into Stanford might end their relationship because she is only a high school junior, but she supports him anyway.    A lesser movie might have the girlfriend try and sabotage him.   

Shaun's grades are surely good enough to get him into Stanford, plus being class president, but a daffy guidance counselor (Tomlin) attaches another student's poor grades to Shaun's profile and he is rejected.     Shaun decides to take Lance and Ashley with him to Stanford and convince the dean of admissions (Ramis) that a mistake was made and he would be admitted.    If only it were that easy.    Circumstances arise which make this much more difficult than it has to be, but without these, there would be no movie.    The obstacles aren't contrived and out of thin air, but follow sort of a logical progression and realism.    Only one building burns down in the process, but by the end everyone is happy.

We meet Shaun's pot-smoking buddies, his divorced parents who still carry torches for each other, and his father's trophy wife who may be screwing the help.    They are allowed room to breathe and create their own pockets of insanity while still being touching and sweet.    The movie spends time with these characters also, convincingly giving us an absurd world for Shaun to write about and send the manuscript to Skinner (Kline), who understands Shaun's love/hate relationship with them as well as Orange County itself.

Hanks is the son of Tom Hanks from his first marriage, while Fisk is Sissy Spacek's daughter.    Much was made about their casting, but they are adept, likable comic actors.    There are moments when Colin channels his father, especially when expressing his outrage to the guidance counselor who refuses to admit she messed up.     Orange County doesn't transcend into great comedy, but it warmly observes its people and we find ourselves rooting for them.