The End of Oak Street

It reviews better than it plays — admired more than it is enjoyed.

• “The fact that this film can make space for all these facets of identity to breathe and move makes a movie miracle worth warping to time and time again.”

  Zachary Lee, RogerEbert.com · 100

• “Yet The End of Oak Street, despite its cheeky, ominous title, isn't a movie that wallows in grief. Whether it's the personal loss of a parent or the shared loss of a pre-pandemic America, Mitchell seems to be acknowledging the sadness of those events while being optimistic that we can find our way out of them. If nothing else, that's where the power of cinema, particularly genre cinema, can come through.”

  Bill Bria, Slashfilm · 100

• “For a film that is confident enough to give away a sizeable amount of its premise from the get-go, The End of Oak Street remains filled with surprises and is a complete crowd-pleaser from start to finish.”

  John Kirk, Original-Cin · 100

• “David Robert Mitchell’s The End of Oak Street somehow pulls off the impossible, taking its absurd premise of a suburban neighborhood suddenly warped into prehistoric times and turning it into the sort of classic Amblin romp you’d stumble across while channel surfing and wind up watching through to the end. In a year without an actual Jurassic Park sequel, The End of Oak Street is the summer blockbuster we didn't know we needed.”

  Jake Kleinman, Polygon · 91

• “A crowd-pleasing but winkingly mean-spirited Amblin homage that perfectly captures the sweet menace of movies like “Gremlins” and “The Goonies” (so perfectly, in fact, that it almost feels like you’ve been sucked through a hole in space-time yourself), “The End of Oak Street” is what multiplexes have been missing from recent summers: Lean, clever, original, cheer-at-the-screen entertainment that will traumatize 10-year-olds for life and make their parents feel like they’re kids again.”

  David Ehrlich, IndieWire · 91