– An Unofficial and Unprofessional Review of The End of Oak Street –

I have the privilege of having intense interests that oftentimes overlap with one another. The two main interests of mine are dinosaurs (and any other prehistoria) and film. While they don’t overlap often, paleo-media has its own niche and intense audience ready to lunge at any sign of inaccuracies and creative liberties. There are but a few that hold the spotlight among the community. These special few include the Jurassic Park film trilogy (while only recently was Jurassic Park 3 exonerated from wide hatred due to the lackluster quality of the recent World films), the beloved BBC Walking With Dinosaurs documentary, the tv mini-series Prehistoric Park starring the adored Nigel Marvin, and the recent Apple tv docuseries Prehistoric Planet praised for its photorealism and portrayal of dinosaurs as regular animals. 

In-between all of those beloved films and shows are some real bottom shelf stinkers. While the Jurassic IP dominates the world of dinosaur film, there are a unique few that pop up in theaters every now and then to combat the billion dollar franchise, usually to the result of low box office and poor critical reception. 

Dinosaur fans and paleo nerds are desperate for something new. A good dinosaur film that finally combats the highly successful franchise and gives the genre some variety. Hopefully  also giving Universal and Spielberg notable competition that forces them to put more thought and care into the future of Jurassic.

Prior to this year’s The End of Oak Street, the most recent non-Jurassic dinosaur film was  last year’s adaptation of Ethan Pettus’s novel Primitive War. The film was a fairly decent movie from a technical standpoint but lacked in its creativity. Primitive War had a myriad of issues behind the scenes that ranged from criminal accusations of actors and admittance of using generative artificial intelligence in the pre-production by the director and creative team. There were also some larger accusations against the director Luke Sparke for not paying cast and crew what they were owed and fled the country of Australia to avoid prosecution for financial fraud. Ultimately, the film bolstered a 60% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes, a 2.7/5 average on Letterboxd, and finished its limited box office run at $1.2 million worldwide on a $7 million budget. Despite the financial failure of the film, word of mouth helped the film gain traction on streaming and is one of the rare “not terrible” dinosaur films outside of the Jurassic franchise. On the opposite end of this spectrum, the 2023 film 65 starring Adam Driver is one of the only films I saw in theaters that nearly made me cry out of frustration. At one point I found myself burying my face in my hands so upset that a movie with as cool of a premise that it has could be such lazy, uninspired drivel with completely unidentifiable Cretaceous creatures. 

It was after viewing these films that I really pondered if we were ever going to get a REAL dinosaur film that stood alone as its own thing. One that not only uses inspired and identifiable dinosaurs as the focus on the film but also functions well as a well made movie. 

For the past few years, director David Robert Mitchell had been teasing his new film produced by JJ Abrams titled “The End of Oak Street”, formerly named “Flowervale Street”. It had been rumored for some time that this new film that stars Ewan McGregor and Anne Hathaway would feature dinosaurs in at least some capacity. The first tease of the movie dropped which showcased a large silhouette of an unidentified sauropod. From this moment, the magnifying glass was centered on this film’s production for any new details regarding dinosaurs. Many presumed it would just feature the predictable crew of Tyrannosaurus Rex and velociraptors, as those are the household names. I was also skeptical of the movie’s dedication to the focus on the dinosaurs. I was almost certain they would use them in a limited spot to save vfx budget and build tension, as the director is famous for in his debut feature It Follows, a tense and suspenseful horror film I quite like. If there wasn’t a good focus on the dinosaurs, I was comfortable knowing that the film would still be in good directorial hands. 

The first teaser trailer of the film was released in late March, four months prior to the theatrical release. The teaser only shows a small glimpse of the film’s main extinct antagonist (Allosaurus), but it was just enough to generate buzz surrounding the confirmation that the film will be focused on dinosaurs. 

With much of the context out of the way and me having now viewed the movie twice, I’m happy to rave that The End of Oak Street is the dinosaur film I’ve been waiting for. The film opened to very positive critical reception at 86% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 3.2 on Letterboxd. The film had a budget of $80 million and is expected to have a mediocre to average box office.

The story follows the Platt’s, a regular suburban family in the early 1980’s who wake up one day to find their neighborhood has been transported to a mesozoic jungle full of dinosaurs and other prehistoric horrors. 

The tone of the film is VERY Ambling-esque. Adventurous, dangerous, and full of spectacle. The Amblin-like tone was perfect for the improbable plot of the film because once you attempt to explain the logistics of the events, it all falls apart. The movie avoids this by keeping it through the eyes of the suburban family, allowing us to experience this horrifically random cosmic event with as much suddenness as the family feels it. We don’t have much time to truly consider the why and how, as the new and unfamiliar world doesn’t allow that time for pondering. This is a great way to go about building a world around a movie like this because sometimes ridiculous things simply just needs to happen in order for the plot to progress. Indiana Jones decided magic was real. Jurassic Park decided dinosaur DNA is still viable to clone. The way the audience responds to the logic depends on the confidence of the films justification, and Oak Street does a fine job at tip-toeing that line of improbability.

The pacing of the first act was a bit slow for me, though necessary for fleshing out our characters. 

I found the human characters to be rich with personality and charming for the most part. The parent characters Denise and Greg have a complicated marriage falling apart due to lack of communication and faltering finances. The two children Audrey the older sister and Brian the younger brother I felt could have been fleshed out a bit more as Brian’s main goal is to find his dog Starbuck amidst the chaos while Audrey is astronomy obsessed and tasks herself with finding her runaway brother to make sure he’s safe among the stalking hoards of what I assume were Coelophysus. 

The film’s most charming moment is also the big relief of tension it very much needed after a night of Spinosaurus attacks and stalking Coelophysus. The family is reunited with one extra child to take care of. Concerned about the booming groan echoing close by, the parents go investigate before they backyard-hop back to their home. As they round a corner they see the source of the groaning. A smaller sauropod’s front legs are propped on the roof of a house while another larger sauropod is arched upwards from behind thrusting. Their necks are intertwined and their foreheads are meeting at the end of this titanic ritual. The characters laugh and loosen their shoulders, allowing themselves to see the freakishly improbable turn their lives have taken. This scene helps remind us that these dinosaurs are not monsters in any sense, but rather just animals also thrown into this new unknown. I found this scene to be incredibly grounding, especially on the second watch knowing what comes next. 

The dinosaur designs are okay. Not perfect, but I feel that they work stylistically for the aesthetic the movie was going for. There were some designs better than others for sure but most of them work within the context of the film. Many of them are designed after early 1980’s paleo-art which I found to be a really charming creative decision. While they may not be fully accurate, they are still distinguishable enough to where you can tell what species they are (if you are more familiar with dinosaurs than the regular person) without them being name dropped by a paleontologist or autistic child shoehorned into the story with the sole purpose to tell you. 

I really liked the decision to go with the Allosaurus over the famed T. Rex. as the Rex has had enough spotlight for the time being. Allosaurus, nicknamed “The lion of the Jurassic” was treated as the prehistoric carnivore that it was rather than as a monster. When we’re introduced to our allosaurus, he sees our characters first with their backs turned. Like any predator, he stalks toward them, not introducing himself with a roar but instead slowly lurks forward until his prey begin to scatter in fear. This is a subtle but significant improvement on the portrayal of carnivorous dinosaurs in film as it stalked until it was close enough to make a move rather than roaring from a distance before making its pursuit. A small design choice that went a long way with me was covering the allosaurus with scars, deep bleeding gashes, and battle wounds. With them being known as the lion of the Jurassic I interpreted the various marks to be a nod to that nickname, showing that this species will take on almost anything regardless of size. 

On the flip side of things, do not get me started on the fluffy sauropods. They were cute, for sure, but that was just too much for me. I could not come up with anything to justify why the sauropods were covered in fur. Just… don’t get me started. 

There were many more species than I expected to see as well. I expected the film to focus on the dinosaurs we see outright but there were plenty to enjoy, many of which didn’t exist in the mesozoic like the Titanoboa (massive extinct snake) which got its own spine chilling scene. I really appreciated that the filmmakers went with multiple prehistoric creatures. Many of which have not been portrayed in anything other than documentaries. 

As for the film’s ending, I felt that it was portrayed as much too uplifting, as the implications from the final few minutes leave some heavy questions on the future of the family and potentially the world. There are plenty of places the story could go from the infinite loose threads left in the end, but if the film stays as a one off, I’m just happy the movie got made. 

The End of Oak Street does not take itself overly serious and is ridiculously fun and full of genuine artistic drive. David Robert Mitchell balances dinosaur carnage with family drama just well enough to make an incredibly entertaining dinosaur film that pushes its PG-13 rating to the absolute limit.

I give The End of Oak Street four and a half fluffy sauropods out of five.