A mysterious cosmic event uproots Oak Street from 80s suburbia to prehistoric times... It's the blockbuster surprise of the summer.
This year has seen her battle shared trauma through the exorcism of shimmering red fabric in Mother Mary. 2026 has also witnessed her navigate corporate threats to save a fashion magazine (The Devil Wears Prada 2) and fight off pesky suitors hungry for her husband's throne (The Odyssey).
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Now, Anne Hathaway is striving to survive the suburban anxiety of 1980s America by taking a stotgun to a dinosaur's face in David Robert Mitchell's The End Of Oak Street.
Seriously, what can't this woman do? She's certainly making it clear that while Tom Holland and Zendaya may be the ideal poster couple for two of this summer's box office juggernauts (The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day), 2026 is first and foremost a Hathayear.
She stars in Mitchell's return to the big screen after an eight-year absence, playing Denise Platt, the core of what is seemingly the perfect nuclear family - composed of Greg (Ewan McGregor) and their two children, Audrey (Maisy Stella) and Brian (Christian Convery). And let's not forget their delightful menace of a dog, Starbuck.
However, there's trouble lurking beneath the surface of their middle-class idyll. Denise and Greg aren't communicating properly and are on the verge of a divorce. He's doing stints as a pizza delivery man to cover up the loss of his job; she's growing tired of the provincial mum act and has been secretly writing a novel to process her unspoken desire to pack up and leave her family.
To make matters worse, Brian has broken the arm of a local bully and is secretly smoking (gasp!), while Audrey... Well, Audrey is worried about the potential divorce but is quoting Carl Sagan like a champ, so she's basically got her shit together when it comes to being a teenager.
Things do get significantly knottier when strange prehistoric plants begin sprouting in a neighbour's garden, and the radio mentions "usual ripples in space" and strange "solar flares". Before you know it, a flash in the night transports the entire community from 1982 to the prehistoric age, with jungle surrounding the outer boarders and paleontologically accurate dinosaurs starting to get very rowdy indeed.
"Mom? Is this the end of the world?"
Well child, it's more of an unexplained teleportation deal, but it sure does feel like Dinogeddon. Puts marital strife into perspective, don't it?
For his pivot from indie movies to big blockbuster thrills, the director of It Follows and Under The Silver Lake has delivered one of the best summer adventures of the year. It's certainly the best dinosaur movie since 1993.
Faint praise, granted, considering the absolute drivel the Jurassic World films have been, but when your survival dino thriller has enough heart to hold up to Jurassic Park, that's no small feat.
Mitchell wears his Spielberg / Amblin film influences on his sleeve, with unmistakable callbacks to E.T., The Goonies, and of course, Jurassic Park. These references are only cemented further with Michael Giacchino’s excellent score, which features all the hallmarks of a boisterous John Williams effort. However, more than a fetishistic 80s pastiche (we're looking at you, Stranger Things) or a derivative exercise in nostalgia baiting, Mitchell has instead fashioned a family adventure that is packed with tense set-pieces, suspenseful beats and crucially, heart. The director has clearly learned from Jaws how to gradually tease and smartly reveal his monsters before letting gnarly pandemonium unfurl, but at no point does he forget to develop character-driven moments.
By fleshing out the family's dynamics and never losing focus of their inner struggles, the fight for survival becomes grounded and even more suspenseful. We see it through some very deliberate framing and delicious split diopter shots (plaudits due to DP Mike Gioulakis), but also a character emphasis which leads to surprisingly heartfelt and at times shocking moments. And without wishing to unduly read too much into it, there's a potent metaphor in there somewhere for how displaced suburbia embodies existential dread.
Primarily though, The End Of Oak Street is a finely-tuned crowd-pleaser, a survival roller-coaster benefitting from brisk pacing, smooth editing, and decent genre-blending. It's a dinosaur adventure, with immaculately designed CGI beasties; a frequently funny blockbuster which understands the inherent absurdity of the Oak Street predicament, featuring Camarasaurus humping, a theropod discovering the joys of ice cream, and what Dr. Ian Malcolm would have referred to as "one big pile of shit"; and an action thrill ride that doesn't skimp on horror. Indeed, Mitchell orchestrates some ruthlessly effective kills and plenty of gasp-triggering sequences which shan't be spoiled here.
While that may sound like a bit of a discordant jumble, Mitchell's emphasis on characters makes these elements mesh and ring true.
For all it gets right, there are some issues along the way.
While Anne Hathaway carries the film with both strength and relatable pathos, a less fortunate McGregor is saddled with rickety dialogue and a line-delivery that sounds stilted. Granted, Greg is supposed to be the optimistic / dopey dad counterpart to Denise's more practically-minded mother, but some parts of his performance don't quite land.
Then there's the afterthought ending. Again, no spoilers here, but the screenplay seems to lose its nerve when certain plot conveniences are waved away with an all too abrupt happy ending. Despite fitting in well with the unabashed old-school Amblin adventure vibe, the final five minutes will rub some audience members up the wrong way.
The ride is thrilling enough during the runtime to not care whether The End Of Oak Street sticks to an ultimately familiar template, but a trick was missed for the finale. It makes you wish that some shadowy enigma was teased further regarding a certain spherical MacGuffin, or that the underlying Twilight Zone-ness of it all was leaned into a bit harder. Considering J.J. Abrams is lead producer, even a Cloverfield spin wouldn't have gone amiss.
Still, when a last-minute stumble is preceded by top-tier entertainment which manages to pack violent thrills with enough outlandish absurdity and heartfelt emotion, it's had to complain too much. And who's going to argue against yet another 2026 movie which Anne Hathaway has once again raptor around her little finger (without forgetting a vital assist from Starbuck)? Saur-tainly not us.
The End Of Oak Street hits cinemas on 14 August.
