You know it’s a good year when you get two Spielberg films in the span of a few months... even if one of those films isn’t actually directed by the man himself. But The End of Oak Street, the latest from director David Robert Mitchell, might as well be. It’s an Amblin film in its bones, taking heavy inspiration from Jurassic Park, Poltergeist, E.T., and even a bit of Back to the Future. But it also makes a lot of sense that J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot Productions is behind the film. Oak Street is not secretly a Cloverfield movie, as many people predicted before its release, but it is still powered by a sci-fi twist.
In Oak Street, a quiet Michigan suburb circa 1982 finds itself suddenly transported millions of years into the past. That means, when the Platt family wakes up on a random summer morning, they find dinosaurs skulking just outside their door. How they (and their neighbors) wound up in this situation is a question that comes second to Mitchell’s clear affinity for dino-influenced terror, but once Oak Street has its fun putting the Platts through primal existential fear, it eventually dives into a time-twisting final act.
