Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Hayden Kane There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Justina The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

btm1 I just finished watching this on TV. The story is about several weeks in the lives of three bothers. Circumstances (what they are is unimportant) have caused the two younger bachelor brothers to move in with their older married brother and his family. The script explores the relationships between three loving Irish Catholic American brothers, each with a distinctive personality, and the relationships each has with the women in their lives. It's about real love and romance (not the sappy romantic comedy type), fears of commitment, and the twists and turns these men go through in dealing with that aspect of their lives. Their Catholicism has a lot to do with the story. At one point Patrick says to his Jewish girl friend, "I go to Church every week; you go to Temple only once or twice a year." She replies, "Yes, but your religion is crazy." Although the most religious of the three, Patrick, goes against the Church's teachings in that he uses condoms; but, he worries about going to Hell should he commit other serious sin. Marriage to all of them means a life-long commitment. Their mother's life set the standard for them. She had lived 35 years in a forced, loveless marriage until her husband passed away. That freed her to go to the man she had been in love with when circumstances caused her to marry the boys' father. Abortion was out of the question, as was divorce.Ed Burns is credited with writing and directing the film and he also is very credible as the middle brother. While the entire cast made their characters seem real, the actor who in my mind stood out is Mike McGlone, who plays Patrick, the youngest brother who has a kind of altar boy personality. Perhaps Ed Burns' choice of camera angles gets some of the credit for making his performance particularly memorable, but McGlone brought something special to that part.

vhmascitti I wound up watching the movie by accident and it turned out to be an experience much like passing road kill: It's so horrid you can't look away.And because it was so awful, I thought it might be fun to read a few reviews of it (reading reviews of bad movies is somewhat cathartic; you watch something awful and then let someone else vent about your wasted time....). What I found here was somewhat unbelievable. Somebody actually thought it had some redeeming features. It doesn't.This film did not just have a surfeit of uninteresting characters who spoke extraordinarily turgid dialogue (one character says to the other "I don't think we should see ONE ANOTHER for awhile...." Nobody, really nobody, ever says ONE ANOTHER except in church.) It was also woodenly acted, nonsensically directed and had a plot so boring I kept switching to Tony Robbins infomercials for excitement. Shoestring budget or not, there's no excuse for inflicting this kind of movie on the paying public. Okay, I didn't actually pay to see it because it was on Bravo, but I paid my cable bill and that should count for something.Bottom line is that this movie isn't funny, isn't sad, isn't thought provoking and isn't interesting. It is annoying.

joseayarza That's it. That's the word that describes it all. "The Brothers McMullen" certainly is not the worst movie I have ever seen, but it's perhaps the dullest one. I don't know, I just have the feeling that the movie just kept focusing on the same and the same and the same, and grew tiresome. It needed some plot twists or new characters at the middle to give it a bit of fresh air, because honestly, the situations it presented were like trivial for me. Much as I wanted, I just didn't care about the characters or situations. However the movie has some high points. For example, the acting is pretty acceptable, especially if we considered that some (if not all) of the cast members were debuting in this film. The direction and camera work were nothing special, but not a disaster, like in other B-movies. Also, one of the good things about "The Brothers McMullen" is that it avoids cliches.However, this movie was just too light for me. It needed more intensity. Sometimes it seemed like not even the characters cared about the situations presented. "She's the one", Burns' next film, was panned because it wasn't as realistic as this one. That's true, without a doubt, but at least that other film was more entertaining than this one, even if, admittedly, was completely formulaic and contrived. Rating 5/10.

aorourke I suffered through this movie when it first came out and was just reminded of it and so motivated to warn others that it's only charming if you like bad jokes about female and Jewish stereotypes. The disgust still lingers.