The End of Oak Street (2026)

 

It's great when we get to the end of summer and there are still movies coming out that treat the summer as if it is an endless opportunity for fun. “The End of Oak Street” is one of those movies that makes August bearable in spite of the heat ( which by the way in Texas has been 103°) , and the pending gloom of fall, and for those who care, a return to school.

I am a big fan of a previous film from David Robert Mitchell ( although I'm not sure you should trust somebody who has three first names), "It Follows ".  That film would truly classify as a horror movie, I'm not so sure however if “The End of Oak Street” fits that category. In many ways it is a horror film because it is a Creature Feature and humans are being hunted by monsters in the story. However because the monsters in this story are dinosaurs, I may be inclined to call this an adventure story rather than a horror movie. This is a distinction I plan on talking about with my friends on the LAMBcast later this week.

There have probably been other people who have said it, but from my perspective this is the best sequel in the Jurassic Park series, since Jurassic World.  Technically of course it's not a Jurassic Park story at all, but its roots are clearly grounded in the same kind of Summer adventure and thrills that those movies have mined successfully for the last 30 years. This one sort of reverses the scenario, and instead of visiting a park with Dinosaurs, the Dinosaurs show up in your backyard.

Eventually we do get a discussion of how this whole thing happened, but that's the least interesting part of the film. What works best is the family dynamic, of two parents and two teen children struggling to survive in a clearly hostile environment, one in which many of their neighbors do not survive. The dinosaurs in this movie represent a wide variety of species, and many of them seem to have very aggressive tendencies, which I suppose is exactly what you want if you're creating a summer thriller.

Ewan McGregor and Anne Hathaway star as the parents, who are of course struggling with adult issues in the 1980s setting in which the film takes place. Hathaway is fully invested in the film and she is the focal point for the dramatic arc of the story. There are all sorts of moments that add a bit of humor to dire circumstances, but expect some gruesome deaths and PG-13 violence.  Some people will have an issue with the resolution, but don’t think too hard about it all. Just sit back and enjoy a fun family thriller with enough bite to keep it real.