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‘My Son Hunter’ Shows Flashes of What Hollywood Missed

Subversive satire’s most shocking surprise? Embracing Hunter Biden’s humanity

Hunter Biden symbolizes everything that’s wrong with both Hollywood and the mainstream media.

The former ignored the First Son’s potentially criminal behavior and comic potential. No late-night shows made him a recurring punchline, nor did “Saturday Night Live” task one of its “players” to make the troubled Biden a recurring foil.

The latter? Reporters abandoned all objectivity by downplaying Hunter Biden’s connections in 2020 to drag his pappy across the presidential finish line.

“My Son Hunter’s” end credits remind us of that sorry state of affairs. We’re treated to a “greatest hits” assembly of reporters suppressing a story they feared might swing the election.

Some suggest they were right.

It’s the perfect way to sum up the film’s purpose, to tell a story every American needed to hear. It also reminds us how “My Son Hunter” gorges on Biden’s business dealings, information that bogs down a chilling character study born from the “Laptop from Hell.”

My Son Hunter Full Trailer | MySonHunter.com

Laurence Fox of “Lewis” fame stars as Hunter, the drug-addled Biden who feasted on women, drugs and sketchy business deals. He’s a tortured, middle-aged wreck who craves Daddy’s approval and knows he’s the least of the Biden bunch.

So he drowns himself in drugs, using anonymous sex to numb the remaining pain. The film’s opening scenes pack the urgency of a fever dream. They’re also more explicit than what many expect from right-leaning storytellers like producers Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney.

Then again, could anyone tell the Hunter Biden story through a PG:13 lens?

RELATED: ‘PURPLE HEARTS’ HEALS WHILE BIDEN DIVIDES

Hunter learns that his abandoned laptop has a treasure trove of his sins on it for all to see. So he confers with his world-famous father, Joe Biden, for guidance.

“Dynasty” alum John James’ Biden never approaches caricature, nor does the actor dwell on Biden’s diminished mental state.

Smart.

Can father and son keep the laptop out of the headlines? Will Hunter find a connection with a prostitute with the proverbial heart of gold (Emma Gojkovic, impressive)?

Director Robert Davi (“The Dukes”) coaxes strong performances from his cast, even supporting players sharing reams of information to flesh out the full Hunter Biden saga. Davi similarly shows some aesthetic finesse, both with his smart staging and knack for capturing Hunter’s wobbly mindset.

Screenwriter Brian Godawa finds the tortured soul lurking within Hunter Biden, and he refuses to let it stray far from the screen. The recent Ted Kennedy feature “Chappaquiddick” pulled off a similar feat, depicting a man whose monstrous actions didn’t make us forget the soul crushed by his mistakes.

That empathy separates “My Son Hunter” from the far-Left attacks we so often see in pop culture, most notably from the late-night ranks.

'My Son Hunter' director: When Hunter's lawyers came to my set

Still, the film teeters between smart storytelling and sledgehammer polemics. Davi and co. shrewdly deploy Gina Carano as both a Secret Service agent and narrator, the Daily Wire star adding pithy comments along the way.

And yes, some hair will be sniffed before the end credits roll.

It’s more agreeable than how other characters are left to spell out every last detail of the Biden scandals, an ill-fated decision shared by Showtime’s “The Comey Rule.” Both projects chose poorly.

Other, more successful tics include a few “fact check” warnings to let us know what we’re watching actually happened.

There’s creative license in play, of course, but the film’s eagerness to share so many sordid details leaves less room for the story to breathe. The narrative also moves at a frustrating pace, lacking a big-picture sense of how the Bidens provided damage control with the press’ help.

 

 
 
 
 
 
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The film opens by mocking the media’s “mostly peaceful” framing of the Black Lives Matter protests, one of many overt nods to Conservative, Inc. Some characters break the fourth wall, while others endure animated flourishes reminding us “My Son Hunter” is first and foremost satirical.

The abrupt tonal changes should hurt the film, but Davi’s steady hand prevents that from happening.

Other comic morsels are just plain delicious.

“I wanna make him proud of me,” Hunter says of his father, all the while snorting drugs off of the carpet.

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Fox’s performance anchors the film, full stop. He’s convincing as a drugged-out scion running out of time to prove his worth. His Biden is alternately boastful and sad, ready to puff out his chest even if he can’t believe his own hype.

The actor’s commitment to the character, and details too outrageous to be false, paper over “My Son Hunter’s” flaws.

HiT or Miss: Hollywood wouldn’t go near the Hunter Biden story despite its over-the-top details and scandalous allegations. “My Son Hunter” is far from perfect, but it dutifully captures the Biden family’s train wreck relative at his worst.

7 Comments

  1. This is all beefed up hype. Hunter this, Biden that and when it’s time to walk the walk it goes flatter than a pancake at 30,000 feet. I’ve been hearing how crooked this and that is for so long it’s turning into a joke. Right when I begin to think, maybe there is sometimes all this stuff, poof the ballon goes flat! I paid $22.99 to watch this garbage only to have it stop streaming at 26 minutes 33 seconds, as the chick follows Biden being escorted somewhere. I mean where is the beef? This ain’t no hamburger – it’s a veggie bean burger that fell apart – I don’t know who sells this movie but I called American Express and told them – they fixed it faster than a hobo would hit a ham sandwich – so take your hype, conspiracy rhetoric, and stop wasting American time.

  2. Sorry, it just not very good. Just got done watching it on a not to be named Russian Facebook site, and found it fairly pedestrian. Not sure what they were going for here, a satire? a serious deep dive into political corruption? a third rate imitation of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas with C level actors? It’s script and direction is on the scale of a Lifetime movie and it makes Hunter strangely sympathetic, which I don’t believe was the idea. Save your money and search it out for free cause its too boring to squander your dollars on.

  3. I found it to be fresh and actually very funny. The issues it deals with are incredibly serious but in the insane world we live in humor seems a surprisingly fitting way to present them. Throughout the acting was good and sometimes brilliantly subtle. The script was intellectually threaded together.
    Happy to have purchased it.

  4. It’s really a shame how biased this review is.

    I understand that you hate Joe Biden and his son but still I figured you love cinema. And this amateurish piece of crap is not just an insult to cinema itself but also all the proof Left needed to show how dumb people on the Right are.

    People who are dumb made this film. People who are thieves produced it because it sure doesn’t look as if all the crowdfunded money ended up on-screen. And crooked people support it instead of at least pushing it under the rug if the solidarity prevents you from telling the truth.

    1. Nothing about what he said about Joe biden is baised. It’s reality. Signed someone from and grew up in Delaware under a Biden my entire life. Someone that remember the Delaware State News running an expose on Beau Biden’s illicit pay for play to profit Joe Biden.

  5. I can agree with one take away and it was that I never thought I could empathize for Hunter Biden but you do in this movie.

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