Publication Date: 01-06-2026

The Family McMullen (2025) review

Dir. Edward Burns

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★★

“Here’s to a long life and a merry one
To a quick death and an easy one
To a pretty lass and an honest one
To a cold beer and another one”
— Barry (Edward Burns) and Tommy (Pico Alexander)

The Family McMullen joins the pantheon of unexpected sequels that will be gobbled up by a small but faithful audience. We’re in Marfa Girl 2 and Uncle Kent 2 territory with this one. Edward Burns’ latest is a sequel to his directorial debut, The Brothers McMullen, which carries an interesting origins story in itself. Written by a 27-year-old Burns during his time as a production assistant for Entertainment Tonight back in 1993, it was shot for a measly $24,000. With the help of Robert Redford, Burns’ film earned a spot at Sundance in 1995. A distribution deal with Fox Searchlight came and the film was released to strong reviews, and an indie star was born.

Now, Burns is 57-years-old. His legacyquel to his independently funded and filmed darling is significantly more polished, framed, and even structured like an elevated Hallmark movie. Burns is now a father-of-two, and of course his outlook on life and family has significantly matured. The problem isn’t in the maturation so much as it is with the execution. While Burns’ dialog can still crackle with wit and perception, The Family McMullen is overlong melodrama, and unlike its predecessor, has a significantly lower batting average when it comes to engaging plot-threads.

Set some-thirty years after Brothers, Family drops in on the McMullen residents over Thanksgiving. Burns’ Barry is twice-divorced and has two grown kids; his brother, Patrick (Michael McGlone) has separated from his wife; and Jack Mulcahy’s Jack has since passed away, but his widow, Molly (Connie Britton), still plays both the sister-in-law and aunt roles in the family’s life.

About Barry’s kids. His preppy daughter, Patricia (Halston Sage), is preparing to go to law school and is engaged to the only man she’s ever dated, a dork named Terrence Joseph (that’s his full first-name), played by Bryan Fitzgerald. An off-handed remark by Molly at dinner leads to him suddenly deciding that he needs a 30-day hall pass to sleep with whomever to assure marriage is the path he wants to pursue. He encourages Patricia to do the same, and after a lot of blubbering, second-guessing, and counting down the days until the two of them are “back together,” she eventually romances a Greek plumber (Sam Vartholomeos).

Then there’s the son, Tommy (Pico Alexander), a silver-tongued smoothie who aspires to be an actor. This is fitting because he talks like he’s scripted his monologues for the day. He’s also famously dismissive of such ideas as true love, romance, etc until he… but of course, meets a young woman named Karen (Juliana Canfield) who subsequently runs through his mind upon their first encounter like she’s Forrest Gumping. What are the odds Karen’s mother (Tracee Ellis Ross) has a history with Barry?

There’s more drama in The Family McMullen than your average Tyler Perry screed. Not that it’s inherently a bad thing. Burns’ sequel moves at a breezy pace, never dull, always marginally entertaining, and buoyed by a cast that owns their characters very well. Burns’ Barry is such a cantankerous ass that it made me realize if I wanted to hear sarcastic clapbacks to everything I said, I would simply call my own father. McGlone’s Patrick turns out to be the most interesting man on screen. He’s raw and vulnerable following the dissolution of his own marriage, and wallows in his own Catholic guilt.

This has long been an underlying theme of Burns’ work; a thread at which he picks as he tries to unravel the larger, woven puzzle. The Brothers McMullen was about a trio of tightknit brothers forced to grapple with their religious upbringing all while stumblebumming through their own relationships as children of divorced parents who cultivated a toxic household. McGlone’s personal struggle and desire to be morally good and a loyal follower of Christ leads him down the path of trying to mend things with his ex, a stunningly mature decision in a movie where characters appear to act only on impulse.

Burns has difficultly in texturing the younger generation. He peppers their subplots with on-the-nose coincidences and schmaltz. He seems to think too little of Patricia — whose initial introduction leads one to believe she’d dowse her man with wine if he suggested taking a break to seize the opportunity to sleep around — and too highly of Tommy, who I assume is how he views some part of his own younger self. The conflicts for Tommy and Karen feel far too manufactured, underscored by the egregious happenstance that is her mother being one of Barry’s former flings. Even in the “small” borough of Brooklyn, something’s gotta give in the way of plausibility.

While Burns’ directorial chops have certainly evolved, with The Family McMullen looking like one of his most polished works to date, is there such a thing as “too polished?” Every interior in the film appears to be meticulously designed; sets look affluent as opposed to lived-in, which creates the feeling of a sitcom. Burns is (was?) the type of filmmaker who, when funding fell through for one project, grabbed a Panasonic DVX100 camera, secured the bare minimum in financing, and pivoted to another in the dead of winter, with scenes shot mostly outdoors. Seeing something this tidy from a production standpoint feels somewhat artificial.

Like even the weakest Edward Burns movies, it’s hard to outright dismiss The Family McMullen, especially if, like me, you gravitate towards ensemble dramas and stories about complicated families (the holiday season is optional, but always a welcomed backdrop). He can still pen amusing dialog, write a few interesting (older) characters, and in this case, reassemble most of the band to the point where the presence of familiar faces like McGlone and Britton make the film and its warts go down like a smooth glass of Pinot. Maybe a lower-shelf offering, but alas.

My review of The Brothers McMullen

Starring: Edward Burns, Michael McGlone, Pico Alexander, Halston Sage, Connie Britton, Juliana Canfield, Tracee Ellis Ross, Sam Vartholomeos, Brian d’Arcy James, Bryan Fitzgerald, and Shari Albert. Directed by: Edward Burns.