Orange County

Orange County, a comedy about a young man whose college plans are thwarted, has an impressive pedigree--the offspring of director Lawrence Kasdan (Jake), Tom Hanks (Colin) and Sissy Spacek (Schuyler Fisk)--but is little more than an exercise in childish indulgence.

More reprehensible than Kasdan's direction and Mike White's unfunny collection of gross-out gags posing as a script is Jack Black. After a promising start, Black has devolved into cinematic caricature. He spends most of Orange County prancing around in his underwear--the performance equivalent of a third-grade armpit-fart pageant.

The scariest aspect of this film is that Black, Kasdan, Hanks and White are looked at as the next generation of Hollywood stars. They could have learned a thing or 50 from the film's half-dozen cameos--Harold Ramis and Catherine O'Hara squeeze more cinematic juice in their 15 minutes of screen time than all the youngsters combined.

--By Martin Barna