The Fitzgerald Family Christmas (2012)

The Fitzgerald Family Christmas: Directed by Edward Burns. With Kerry Bishé, Edward Burns, Heather Burns, Marsha Dietlein. The adult siblings of the Fitzgerald family prepare for their estranged father to return home for Christmas for the first time since he walked out on his family 20 years ago.

“Edward Burnsu0026#39; Christmas movie deals with the sensitive issue of parental abandonment, and alcoholism, oh, and finding love in middle age, and inter-religion marriage, and finding love in advanced age, and unemployment, and unwanted pregnancies, oh, and spousal abuse, and gold- digging and learning to settle and failing businesses and problematic children, and reconciliation and a few other u0026quot;Bu0026quot; plots. In fact, Burnsu0026#39; script contains so many plots that the alcoholic (or at least the one that has sought treatment for it) Fitzgerald brother returns from rehab, borrows some money from Burnsu0026#39; character and is quickly forgotten about. Burnsu0026#39; attempt to juggle enough family-themed plots to fuel a yearu0026#39;s worth of Lifetime movies for women means that those that donu0026#39;t be resolved essentially get forgotten. On the positive size, the open questions give him a platform to produce sequels until we get u0026quot;Fitzgerald Family Christmas XXII: We Finally Return to Burnsu0026#39; Characteru0026#39;s Romance With the Nurseu0026quot;. In short, the attempt to cram so many sub-plots and characters into a hour and forty minute running time means none receive anywhere near the attention needed to build any suspense or character development – see u0026quot;Home for the Holidaysu0026quot; for a much better realized version of the same idea.”