The Lack Of What Made The 80's Cool Again (The End Of Oak Street review)

 

So what happens when you put Dinosaurs attacking suburban America in the 80's? I think J.J. Abrams and David Robert Mitchell have your answer. The End of Oak Street is the last movie of the summer, in hopes of competing with the very prominent and popular choices that audiences would rather flock to see in cinemas. The concept of this film is interesting, as Anne Hathaway (in her fourth feature this year) and Ewan McGregor are suburban parents, with their two kids played by Maisy Stella and Christian Convery, who are facing difficulties in their nuclear family dynamic and are forced to survive as their street is transported to the age of the dinosaurs. A concept that, personally, intrigued me before I ever watched a trailer. 

Unfortunately, the film seems to be living in an era when the 80s were cool again, but it is instead a reminder that maybe that trend has officially run its course. There have been several TV shows and movies that used the 80's to possibly kickstart what became nostalgia bait today. A significant number of them, especially in this specific genre of child wonder and loss of innocence within sci-fi and fantasy, created enough nuance to find themselves being modern enough to appeal to modern audiences that you would not find in content that was actually made in the 80s. 

The End of Oak Street chose not to take the lessons that made the trend popular; instead, it went further in pleasing audiences who possibly grew up in the 80s rather than creating universal appeal, especially in its characters. Despite great portrayals of the four main cast members who play the Platt family, I felt no connection to them whatsoever. The script gives us plenty of reasons to understand their dynamic, gain sympathy, and go on this journey of self-discovery with them as they try not to get eaten by accurate-looking Velociraptors roaming their backyard; I still felt nothing for them even when the stakes got higher, and they grew less likable. It does waste the potential of how nuanced these characters were, when all I could think about was when each of them was going to die because of their stupidity. 

There is something I will give credit to the family dynamic presented here for. This involves the idea that children think their parents can protect them forever, a sentiment that parents themselves seem to have misguidedly believed they can always live up to. This is ultimately challenged in several ways, including internal conversations between Hathaway and McGregor's characters. Parents don't usually have a big role in most 80s sci-fi fantasy adventures, but seeing their struggle with such threats from that perspective was refreshing. 

The horror elements are very present, due to Mitchell's part and experience in horror. Elements we have been aching to see but have been lacking within the more recent Jurassic Park films. The End of Oak Street seems promising for revitalizing these hopes within a non-IP feature, and it does so, to some extent, in the way it treats the dinosaurs featured in the film. That does not change the fact that most of the film unintentionally leaned towards a more camp-than-horror approach in the way the dinosaurs attacked the residents of Oak Street, as it took liberties in pushing the PG-13 rating. 

The most jarring feeling I had by the end of this film, without giving too much away, was that I did not see a point to any of the events transpiring, which ultimately left a sour taste in my mouth as I walked out of the theater. Based on that statement alone, it is safe to say there is a choice to leave things open-ended, reminiscent of the Cloverfield films Abrams also produced, but unlike those movies, this choice made the film more confusing than it needed to be. 

Despite its shortcomings, the themes and stakes were straightforward, but once it began exploring more complex aspects, the adventure lost its steam and purpose. Given its open-endedness, it is very hard not to perceive that decision as just an excuse to end a film the writers and creatives didn't know how to tie together smoothly.