The End of Oak Street

Our Review

David Robert Mitchell (It Follows) and producer J.J. Abrams drop a suburban family into the age of dinosaurs, and the result is the summer’s best straight-ahead survival ride. Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor sell the Platt family so well that when the street gets ripped out of 1982 suburbia, you actually care who makes it home.

The premise is simple: a cosmic event lifts Oak Street clean out of its cul-de-sac and sets it down somewhere with teeth. No explanations, no scientist with a chalkboard, just one family learning fast that the neighbors’ houses matter less than the people inside them. Mitchell shoots the mystery like horror before letting the dino set pieces rip, and Michael Giacchino’s score does half the lifting.

It leans on 80s nostalgia and the last act plays it safe, but the craft is real, the effects are excellent, and the family drama never becomes wallpaper. The rare PG-13 blockbuster that respects both its monsters and its people.

If you ever wished Jurassic Park took place on your street with your family in it, this is that movie.