THE END OF OAK STREET is the would-be summer blockbuster written and directed by David Robert Mitchell (IT FOLLOWS, UNDER THE SILVER LAKE). It’s not as distinct as his previous movies, but it’s a mainstream crowdpleaser type of movie with a little quirk. Or at least I’ve heard it pleased whatever crowds it was able to managed – I missed it in theaters, as most people did. But now it’s on video.

At first glance this is one of those “It’s like Amblin!” movies. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “The company that produced HAMNET?” But there was a time before HAMNET when people invoked that name to mean PG-rated movies about suburban kids having adorably mildly scary encounters with aliens, ghosts or pirate skeletons. Here we have a J.J. Abrams production set in the early ‘80s, with almost as much “you know – like Steven Spielberg” gloss as his own SUPER 8, but I think there’s a bit of a tilt to it. It has a haze of nostalgia that borders on too cute (especially with Michael Giacchino’s score laying it on so thick), but then it throws some Dinosaurs Attack! meanness at you every once in a while. Gives it some kick.

Like many movies by the aforementioned master, it involves some kids and some parents with some marital tensions. The clearest sign of this is that Denise Platt (Anne Hathaway, SERENITY) has written an entire novel without telling her husband Greg (Ewan McGregor, MILES AHEAD). The second clearest sign is that her nice old neighbor Mrs. Huddleston (Anne Gee Byrd, PROJECT: ALF) who does know about the book praises the part where the protagonist has a suitcase packed and ready to move to New York and looks out the window at her kids crying. Geez, how did you get into the shoes of that character? It’s so vivid!

The Platts’ oldest, Audrey (Maisy Stella, MY OLD ASS), idolizes Carl Sagan and doesn’t fit in with the other girls. Their youngest Brian (Christian Convery, “young Victor Frankenstein” in Guillermo del Toro’s FRANKENSTEIN) does have a bunch of friends, but seems to be a little shit. They’re all expecting him to get beat up by older kid Kaden (Hudson Meek, “Young Baby” in BABY DRIVER), but it’s for causing Kaden’s younger brother to crash his bicycle. You could argue Brian is the neighborhood bully, not Kaden.

This is a Twilight Zone kind of movie where some weird shit happens for no reason and the point isn’t to explain it. Concern yourself with the what if, not the why. First, Mrs. Huddleston discovers a prehistoric plant growing in her yard. Then another neighbor, Mel (P.J. Byrne, BABYLON), accuses the Platt kids of planting the enormous pile of shit he found in his backyard. It’s a decade before JURASSIC PARK will come out, so nobody thinks about it being dinosaur shit.

Then all the sudden there’s a flash and a sound and the power and water are out and they hear some screaming. They just take it as a temporary outage (an homage to that other beloved Amblin film, THE TRIGGER EFFECT) until, out looking for their dog, Denise and Greg separately get chased by hairy dinosaurs. A real what-in-the-holy-fuck moment for them. They try to get out of there but all the roads end in prehistoric plantlife or cliffs, because a chunk of their neighborhood is raised in a perfect circle like they live in DARK CITY.

The dinosaurs are provided primarily by ILM, they’re as convincing as in the JURASSIC PARK movies, but I appreciate that they feel a little different. There’s more of an emphasis on feathers and fur, and Mitchell gets alot of mileage out of making them move pretty slow. They can’t eat you right away but they’ll keep coming and what the fuck are you gonna do, you’re not an action hero, you’re just some dad working as a pizza delivery driver telling his wife it’s a side gig because he’s embarrassed he got laid off by Chrysler.

I love how Mitchell and cinematographer Michael Gioulakis (JOHN DIES AT THE END, US) stage it with lots of long takes, often with creatures moving in the distance without the Platts noticing them. There’s a great dinosaur version of the IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS “Do you read Sutter Cane?” guy, but it’s a t-rex coming at them. Uh, guys… behind you! Then it’s taken to the next level when they keep not noticing the (SPOILER) giant white snake slithering through their house – I’d put that on my list of best scenes of the year. I really did hear this was a good audience movie, and I can see why.

It’s funny to me that Denise is a pretty good shot with a rifle but the men and boys can never hit anything. There’s a scene where Mel is on his roof shooting at the sky and the Platts next door seem to be in way more danger of being hit than the pterodactyls.

It’s fair to assume Brian will be some wish-fulfilling every-kid hero, but he turns out to be kind of an annoying wiener. He carries a bow and arrow in normal times but in dinosaur times can barely shoot with it. He has at least one heroic deed but still can’t stop whining “What are we going to do?” When Denise finally snaps at him and then feels bad about it it’s very effective because I was ready to yell at him long before that.

A little touch I enjoyed is that Brian clearly has a very traditional crush on “the new girl” down the street named Jeannette (Jordan Alexa Davis, Vampirina: Ghoul Girls Rock) and gets the opportunity to be the hero who helps her survive, but then she hits it off better with his big sister, if you know what I mean. I’m unclear if he gets it, either. Poor kid.

I always enjoy McGregor, even if I joked about starting a band called “Ewan McGregor’s American Accent.” But Hathaway is the one who makes the movie work. She’s all-in on the emotional life of silently-suffering-‘80s-mom while also having to run around and do stunts with animated monsters. The moment when she (SPOILER) sees that the basement is flooded and realizes that her novel is gone but has no one to talk to about it crushed me. Then a snake is trying to eat her and hasn’t she been through enough?

People my age (which is almost the same age as Mitchell) scoff at ‘80s nostalgia like Stranger Things where kids are so cool they have perfect THE EVIL DEAD and THE THING posters in their bedrooms. So I enjoyed that this one had pop culture references that are not considered cool to modern eyes. Brian loves Battlestar Galactica so much he named his dog Starbuck. He has a J. Geils Band poster on his wall. We see Love Boat on the tv. There’s a prominent Steve Winwood needle drop.

I think Starbuck is a pretty good character because we hear about what a pain in the ass he is, digging under fences, shitting all over the place, ruining block parties, he just sounds like a terrible dog to have, but also Mel is such an uptight prick about it that you sort of appreciate the dog for making him mad. I was genuinely unsure if this was a dog allowed to die in a movie or not.

Mitchell does a good job of riding the line between PG-13 scary and dark humor – there’s a constant tension, some surprising brutality, but also some big, guilty laughs at the misfortunes of random innocents. It’s nothing deep but it’s a pretty good romp.