Of all the dinosaur movies that have come out over the last few decades, there’s little doubt that the Jurassic Park movies are the best known and, more than 30 years after the first installment hit the big screen, they haven’t yet been usurped as the quintessential dinosaur films. However, that hasn’t stopped many movies from trying in the years since, from Adam Driver’s unusual sci-fi thriller 65 in 2023 to myriad animated movies geared towards kids. This summer, yet another dinosaur movie joined their ranks, this one, titled The End of Oak Street, starring Star Wars fan favorite Ewan McGregor and Princess Diaries star Anne Hathaway as a married couple who, alongside their two kids, get mysteriously transported millions of years into the past and come face to face with violent dinosaurs.
What ensues is a bloody, action-packed story that (perhaps accidentally) proves to be absolutely hilarious. Despite that intriguing premise, the star-studded cast, and audiences’ ongoing love of dinosaurs, this movie unfortunately became a box office disappointment, grossing just $53 million domestically and $118 million worldwide, approximately. Curiously, though, that poor performance at the box office hasn’t directly translated to negative reception by those who went to see it. As of right now, The End of Oak Street has an 86% critic score and 76% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, neither of which is terrible by any means. Based on that alone, viewers who didn’t flock to theaters may want to give The End of Oak Street a chance, and now, that just got so much easier.
The End of Oak Street Is Coming to Digital, and It’s Actually Worth a Watch
As of tomorrow, The End of Oak Street will be available to stream at home on digital, and while the speed with which that became available is likely representative of the fact that it flopped at the box office, it does potentially mean that more viewers will now be giving it a chance. Hopefully, that’s the case, as the movie’s box office numbers really don’t reflect how much fun the film is. Is it going to dethrone the Jurassic Park movies? No, although there are arguably Jurassic World movies that The End of Oak Street is better than or at least more fun to watch. Even outside of that competition, though, The End of Oak Street really is worth a watch, especially now that it will be available to stream at home.
McGregor and Hathaway are, unsurprisingly, great in their roles, the premise is actually different from other dinosaur stories (even if it still makes very little sense), and it’s frankly just representative of a silly summer flick that will get some genuine laughs out of viewers—even if those laughs are coming while some of the film’s most important characters are being torn apart by dinosaurs. It’s presumably still not going to become a smash hit at home, but if you like dinosaurs, McGregor, and/or Hathaway, or you simply need a laugh, it’s worth checking out.