According to the British online newspaper The Independent, the film centers on "allegations made by Trump allies" about Hunter Biden's foreign business deals.[9][10] The producers stated that the film depicts the alleged "business dealings and lifestyle of Hunter Biden".[11]
Two conservative Irish filmmakers, Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer, developed the film. When the film was first announced, it introduced its attempt to raise 2.5 million dollars[20] via a private crowdfunding site. The project raised over 2.5 million dollars from crowdfunding on its official site.[21] Pre-production started as early as February 2021 according to star Gina Carano.[6] The movie's crew includes Robert Davi as director,[10] and Phelim McAleer & Ann McElhinney as producers.[4]
Gina Carano, who played a "world-weary" secret service agent in the film stated: "The script was instantly intriguing and side achingly hilarious to me, especially after being newly exposed to the political realm in 2020. Robert Davi is someone who reached out to me as soon as I was 'canceled' in Feb. 2021. I signed on in support of him and one of my favorite humans, Laurence Fox."[11]
Production began in October 2021 in Serbia,[6][11][22] and lasted for four weeks.[4][2] During filming John James, who portrayed Joe Biden, had an off-set injury and was rushed to the hospital, though he continued filming after treatment saying that "the show must go on".[16]
Armond White of National Review said that the film "serves a muckraking, restorative function", and wrote: "Make no mistake, McAleer is polemical, but My Son Hunter doesn't condemn Hunter Biden so much as understand him and the nature of his offense—thus demonstrating the ultimate form of journalistic scruples."[24]
Naomi Fry of The New Yorker called the film "an amateurish, often batshit, if very occasionally vulgarly amusing satire-cum-thriller-cum-melodrama-cum-propaganda-organ, which switches between modes with the head-spinning unexpectedness of a Surrealist cutup."[25]
Kaiser, Jonas; Rauchfleisch, Adrian; Bourassa, Nikki (March 15, 2020). "Connecting the (Far-)Right Dots: A Topic Modeling and Hyperlink Analysis of (Far-)Right Media Coverage during the US Elections 2016". Digital Journalism. 8 (3). Routledge: 422–441. doi:10.1080/21670811.2019.1682629. S2CID211434599.