The More the Merrier (1943) User Reviews (83)

The great film that time forgot

[mik-19 · 9/10 · 30 April 2005]

What otherworldly power decides what films survive in the public mind decade after decade? And what films don't? 'The More the Merrier' is completely forgotten, although in its time, during WWII, it was a huge hit and was nominated for several of the most prestigious Academy Awards, Best Picture, Director, Leading Actress, Script etc. And deserved every one of those nominations. It is, simply a great film, that time forgot, and one that is finally out on DVD. And it remains a mystery how a sexy, sassy, down-to-earth and abundantly funny film such as this could ever be forgotten.

In the Washington of 1943, with the housing crisis brought on by the war, single working girl Jean Arthur feels compelled to do her bit and let out half of her apartment. Well-to do businessman Charles Coburn, who has arrived in town too early for a conference and cannot find a vacant hotel room, moves in with her, and, wanting to play Cupid, he sublets, unbeknownst to her, his half of half her apartment to a young soldier, Joel McCrea, on town on a mysterious purpose.

Rumour has it that Garson Kanin, of later 'Adam's Rib' fame, wrote the script for 'The More the Merrier', but never took credit. Whoever did it, the premise and even more so the execution of the plot is wonderfully crisp and superbly done. There is not one moment in this film that doesn't work on an extremely advanced level, and as sheer exuberant fun! And the replay value of the DVD is infinite.

George Stevens, one of the truly great American directors, has titles such as 'Gunga Din', 'Penny Serenade', 'Woman of the Year', 'A Place in the Sun', 'Shane' and 'The Diary of Anne Frank' to his credit, and 'The More the Merrier' has won a place in that exalted category of masterpieces in all genres. It is obvious that Stevens got a kick out of directing his actors in this movie, creating a many-colored carpet with all this apparently improvised dialogue, so magnificently stylish and at the same time with a looseness, a naturalness in structure that makes the movie feel like a slice of real life.

But of course real life was never as wonderful as this! Just imagine having known characters like the ones played by Miss Arthur and Mr McCrea, in one respect they are so typical and easily recognizable, and in another they are so immensely attractive, and not just in a physical sense, that you would want them for your best friends. In a strict Hollywood sense, try and imagine two more gorgeous people in the scene near the end when they, almost but not quite, make out on a the quiet street where they share the apartment! The film is great, no two ways about it.

Wonderful, endearing romantic comedy

[FANatic-10 · 8/10 · 28 July 1999]

I truly love this wonderful,endearing romantic comedy from Hollywood's golden age. It has a unique setting - Washington D.C. during the housing shortage caused by World War II, and gets great comic mileage out of the various problems caused by the situation. George Stevens handles it all superbly, but what you remember most are the three charming leads. Charles Coburn justifiedly won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his scene-stealing panache as the elderly Cupid who helps steer Jean Arthur and Joel McCrea towards love. McCrea was an unsung but marvelously effective leading man in the 30's and 40's - rather like Jeff Bridges has been in his career. He's very fine here, and also in the movies he made for Preston Sturges. And Jean Arthur is at her very best - another great who doesn't get enough respect nowadays. Its difficult not to fall in love with her in this film - even if you were blind, her voice alone would knock you off your feet! Its ridiculous that this was her only oscar nomination-but then she, along with Carole Lombard and Irene Dunne were Hollywood's screwball comedy queens, and Hollywood was too busy rewarding the likes of Greer Garson and Luise Rainer.

"Damn The Torpedoes, Full Speed Ahead"

[bkoganbing · 9/10 · 31 May 2007]

In her one and only recognition of sorts from the Motion Picture Academy, Jean Arthur got a nomination for Best Actress for The More the Merrier, a screwball comedy based on the housing shortage in Washington, DC. It was a tough field with veteran players like Greer Garson for Madame Curie, Ingrid Bergman for Casablanca, and Joan Fontaine for the Constant Nymph. But a fresh faced newcomer with only two previous film credits under a different and real name of Phyllis Isley copped the big prize. Spiritual and ethereal beat out funny and sentimental that year as Jennifer Jones won for The Song of Bernadette.

Arthur's well known stage fright manifested itself in non-cooperation with those that give out the awards. There are all kinds of Jean Arthur stories about her running and hiding from fans, her getting physically sick before shooting a scene and then giving a great performance, her total non-cooperation with the press that covers the film industry. It didn't redound to her benefit at Oscar time. Still The More the Merrier is one of her great roles.

My mother's older sister was also one of those government girls who went to work for a flock of new agencies that sprung up during World War II. The country and its people were mobilized to a degree never seen before or since. Would that this president could show the leadership now that FDR showed then against a group of people who would destroy our way of life.

My aunt met her husband in Washington who was deferred from military service because of tuberculosis he had suffered. If she were alive she could attest to the things shown in The More the Merrier. Washington, DC simply did not have the housing available for all the folks now working in the capital.

Jean Arthur is one of those women and to show her patriotic spirit she offers to take in a roommate for splitting the rent. She gets quite a roommate in Charles Coburn, a millionaire who's been caught without a reservation at a hotel.

Coburn was the only one who took home an Oscar from The More the Merrier as Best Supporting Actor. He's one roguish grandfatherly type who decides Arthur needs some male involvement even though she has an engagement of sorts to bureaucrat Richard Gaines. If he was 30 years younger he'd do the deed himself.

So when homeless soldier to be Joel McCrea shows up, Coburn gets his matchmaking skills honed to a fine edge. Dolly Levy could have learned from this man.

McCrea was at the high point of his career, he was taking a break from westerns and doing some of the best comedies around with Preston Sturges and this one with George Stevens. This was his third and final film with Jean Arthur. He had done the Silver Horde a Victorian melodrama with Arthur as the other woman and Adventures in Manhattan where he was miscast. This one however was a winner in every way for him.

Best scene in the film is after Coburn as sublets half of his half of Arthur's apartment to McCrea and they haven't broken the news to Arthur yet. He gets into the shower and while some of us sing, McCrea likes to imitate a seal. Arthur's expressions on hearing the seal noises is priceless.

The More the Merrier got a remake in the Sixties with Jim Hutton and Samantha Eggar and Cary Grant in his final film in the Charles Coburn part. It was good, but not nearly as good as the original.

Don't believe me, see both and compare.

Comic masterpiece!

[zetes · 10/10 · 6 August 2002]

Easily the best film that I've ever seen from George Stevens (and I really like several of his other films). Jean Arthur stars as a woman renting out half of her apartment because of a housing shortage in Washington D.C. Charles Coburn, who is in Washington to help solve the crisis, weasles his way into the apartment even though Arthur didn't want a male roommate. The morning after, Joel McCrea arrives with yesterday's newspaper, not knowing that the vacancy exists no more. No matter, though. Coburn rents half of his half of the apartment to McCrea, unbeknownst to Arthur. God knows this premise could have made one hell of a sitcom, but it also makes a damn funny movie. There isn't an unfunny scene in the entire film, and several scenes vie for the title of Best Romantic Comedy of all times with Preston Sturges' contemporaneous films. The three performers are remarkable. They have great chemistry as a comic trio, and McCrea and Arthur throw sparks off the screen with their surprisingly erotic romance. I failed to mention that Arthur is engaged to an older man, adding to the dilemma. Richard Gaines is also excellent as that fiancé. I love the way his mouth moves. Grady Sutton has a very funny cameo near the end of the film as a waiter. Stevens' direction is exceptional. It's shocking how believably he pulls off the scene in which McCrea and Arthur wander around the apartment without bumping into each other. This is reminiscent of a famous scene from Buster Keaton's The Navigator, and it's even funnier. Or that intimate scene where McCrea gives a carrying case to Jean Arthur. Their acting is so subtly romantic in that scene. I love the way Stevens films it. 10/10.

Screwball Masterpiece.

[TedFonte · 28 March 1999]

One of the greatest romantic comedies ever. The main characters are funny and likable (Joel McCrea is one of the forgotten great romantic comedy leading men of the '30's and '40's), the dialogue is wonderful, and the sense of the period is exact. Two great scenes: 1) McCrea and Arthur on the steps of her apt., he groping her, she fending him off without turning him off--hilarious and sexy; 2) At a factory, a long, long line of women workers is clocking out of work, a male worker (apparently there weren't many) walks toward them, becoming more apprehensive and walking faster as he runs the gauntlet of the women's hoots and hollers (talk about turning the tables)--no revisionism needed here, a primary source for the depiction of the burgeoning of feminism during WWII.

As zany as it gets

[bmcclell-2 · 10/10 · 10 August 2005]

This movie, set in Washington, DC during the early years of the US' involvement in WWII, when DC was still a relatively small city, is sociologically fascinating: the back story is the housing shortage that occurred when everyone descended on the nation's capital in order to organize the country in preparation for war. But the real story is the incredible script, directing (George Stevens) and, most of all comedic acting by Joel McCrea (always the tall, handsome, slightly cynical straight man (whose straightness itself can be hilarious)), Jean Arthur (whose voice I could listen to forever), and, WOW, Charles Coburn as a flustered wealthy tycoon who plays cupid while trying to help solve the country's pressing problems. The comedy is relentless, absolute hilaritas, and it gets zanier by the minute. Very few weak spots in this relatively unknown comedy. Seeing this recently, and a couple of other McCrea comedies directed by Preston Sturges, you have to wonder why Cooper got all the glory while McCrea was frequently relegated to the second tier (despite major box office draws for more serious wartime work).

Wartime Washington was never really this much fun...

[Doylenf · 7/10 · 9 January 2007]

THE MORE THE MERRIER is one of many comedies exploiting the theme of crowded Washington during the WWII period--and one of the best. Personally, I thought it worked best until the point where CHARLES COBURN (in his Oscar-winning supporting role) was booted from JEAN ARTHUR's apartment over reading her diary.

From that point on, the screwball situations became less amusing and the film stretches credibility a bit too far when the comic situations include McCrea suspected of spying on government buildings with his binoculars.

The best moments come early in the film, when Arthur insists on clockwork timing to make getting up in the morning (with a roommate) workable. The frenzied rush to keep to her schedule makes for the most amusing moments in the story, thanks to the artful playing of CHARLES COBURN who is delightful as Mr. Dingle, the man who thinks that she deserves a nice, clean-cut young man rather than the stuffy fiancé she's engaged to. Along comes McCrea, and the rest of the plot has Coburn managing to bring the two lovebirds together.

Amusing spoof of manners and morals of the period, with JEAN ARTHUR and JOEL McCREA shining in the leads and Coburn doing a nimble job of the cupid-playing Dingle with tricks up his sleeve.

The last twenty minutes get a little tiresome, but overall it's a cheerful comedy well worth viewing.

A classic war romantic comedy

[timmauk · 10/10 · 19 June 2001]

This film showed how crowded our nation's capital was during the war. Everyone was there trying to sell their ideas or find ways to improve our war effort. Due to this overcrowding, citizens of Washington DC were asked to be hospitable and let people stay with them. This is where this film gets the idea for this confusing, frustrating and romantic tale.

Picture pretty little Connie(Jean Arthur) living in the fair city of Washington DC. A hard working girl who lives in an apartment by herself. To be patriotic, she decides to rent out her other bedroom. She didn't figure her future roomie would be a male. Now picture Mr. Dingle(Charles Coburn) is a big wig who has come to town to meet with Washington's big wigs. Good golly, his hotel room has been given away and he can not find another place to stay. Guess where he ends up?? Poor Connie.

Now picture young handsome Joseph Carter. Coming to town to show his ideas to improve our flying fleet. He can't find a place either. He runs into our friend Mr. Dingle. Mr. Dingle has a grand idea. Now guess where he is going to stay. Poor poor Connie.

Our dear Connie has a boyfriend who she has been dating, FOREVER!! A Mr. Charles J Pendergast(Richard Gaines). Stuffy, by-the-book, close minded bore. Oh my, he won't like this situation one bit. Poor, poor,...well you get the idea.

This film is a scream. A great script, great direction, and great acting. A great look back into life during the war and wonderful romantic story. Not to mention Jean Arthur's and Charles Coburn's best performances ever.

A classic romantic comedy. You just have to see this!!!

really bogs down

[Qanqor · 6/10 · 12 April 2009]

The movie started very promising, a fun, funny comedy. But somewhere along the line it lost its way, and became ponderous and gloomy, in a way that didn't really make much sense. Some of the other reviews here have gone into that in detail, and they are spot on right, so I won't go through it again. I will just underscore that I quite agree that it makes no sense that the couple goes through with a "fake" marriage after already having declared their love and desire for a real one. It's just head-scratchingly odd, and not at all enjoyable. Seems like all that was contrived just to make the final scene work, but it really wasn't worth it.

Still, Mr. Dingle was a fun character (even if I didn't entirely understand his motivations throughout. Why was he *so* interested in being Mr. Matchmaker?). Conny is rather amusing with her ultra-anal schedule, a side of her which unfortunately isn't really carried through much beyond that scene. There's more to like than dislike in this film. But it doesn't deliver on its initial promise and could've been a whole lot better.

I totally agree with the review here that lists a bunch of superior comedies, and I am indebted to that reviewer, because I've never seen some of them and intend to do so (given the high quality of the ones on the list I *have* seen).

I can only scratch my head at the reviewers here who gave it 9 or 10 stars and thought it was absolutely hilarious. It wasn't.

One of the best movies ever!

[kimbo32 · 10/10 · 2 April 2002]

I have always wanted to see The More the Merrier because I heard good things about it. I finally saw it, and I would recommend it to anyone. Not only is it a funny, funny film, it is also so sweet and tender. The scene on the porch between Jean Arthur and Joel McCrea is very romantic and funny at the same time. Charles Coburn, as the older room renter, is very, very good and gives a hilarious performance that won him an Academy Award. Jean Arthur, in a nominated performance, was as funny as usual, she also has many cool hairstyles. Joel McCrea is also excellent in his role. This was one of the best movies I have ever seen. I suggest that anyone who has wanted to see it, go do so.

It's just OK

[preppy-3 · 6/10 · 4 June 2005]

During the 1940s housing shortage in Washington DC, Constance Milligan (Jean Arthur) decides to take in a boarder to help the war effort. Benjamin Dingle (Charles Coburn) moves in and he, in turn, invites hunky Joe Carter (Joel McCrea) to move in. Complications ensure.

It's beyond me why this is considered a classic. It's not a bad movie just an OK movie. It does have lots of things going for it: Arthur is just wonderful--and beautiful; Coburn is a delight (he won an Oscar for this); it's well-directed and some of the romance works.

But I never believed the story for one second and I didn't find this that funny at all--I thought most of the jokes fell flat. Arthur and Coburn tried but McCrea (never a good actor) just could not do comedy. He did wonderfully in one scene (his expressions when Colburn introduces him to Arthur are quite funny) but he was his usual expressionless self the rest of the movie. He was handsome and hunky--that was about it. Also the ending was just REALLY going too far. I realize I'm in a minority here but I just thought this was so-so. I can truthfully only give this a 6.

Charles Coburn's Oscar: "Damn The Torpedoes..."

[theowinthrop · 10/10 · 29 May 2006]

A brief historic note: On August 5, 1864 a Union fleet commanded by Vice Admiral David Glasgow Farragut, attacked the Confederate Gulf Port of Mobile, Alabama. Farragut had a flock of new monitors in his fleet (although he was aboard his flagship, U.S.S. Hartford), and one of the monitors, the U.S.S. Tecumseh, hit a mine (called a "torpedo" back then) laid by the Confederates. Except for the ship pilot the entire crew of the monitor was lost. There was a wave of uncertainty following this disaster, and the Union ships began seeming to fall apart rather than keeping their lines as planned. Farragut, surveying the disaster from the rigging of his ship, yelled through a megaphone, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" The line became immortal - like John Paul Jones' "I have not begun to fight" or George Dewey's "You may fire when ready Gridley" or Oliver Perry's "We have met the enemy and they are ours." Farragut won the battle, and it remains the greatest naval battle of the American Civil War (outside the "Monitor-Merrimac" duel: see IRONCLADS). The victory happened to be the first good news the North had had in months of stalemated fighting (or worse) in Virginia and Georgia. It was the first of a series of victories that helped change President Abraham Lincoln's certain defeat to reelection victory in November of that year.

I know that it is odd to begin a discussion of a World War II comedy with a brief explanation of a Civil War battle some eighty years earlier, but Farragut's quote is frequently mentioned in the course of THE MORE THE MERRIER - indeed it is sung at one point in an old song by the real star of the picture, Charles Coburn. The song and the quote show his philosophy of life - to get to the heart of the problem and take care of it effectively.

Benjamin Dingle is a millionaire, now doing a "Dollar a Year" job in wartime Washington. There is a housing shortage that Dingle is confronting everywhere, but he finds that there is an advertisement for a roommate that he is determined to grab. It was put into the newspaper by Connie Milligan (Jean Arthur) and Dingle lies his way into getting ahead of anyone else into the apartment. When Milligan points out the obvious sexual problem (male/female roommates?) Dingle points out he's too old for her, and he would actually not be as much of a pest as another woman would be (who might try to borrow her clothes). Subsequently Dingle discovers a young engineer named Joe Carter (Joel McCrae) who also was interested in renting part of the apartment. Dingle decides to rent to Carter, without immediately telling Milligan. There is a great moment when (before Dingle has a chance to tell her) Connie and Joe are able to go through the narrow apartment several times just missing each other.

Connie does not mind the problems of renting to two men, as the presence of two men protects her. But she has an understanding with a bureaucrat, Charles Prendergast (Richard Gaines), who is very image conscious and ambitious - so she hopes to keep the renting of the rooms regarding Joe Carter from him. This becomes more and more difficult as time goes by, as she and Joe find they like each other. Dingle notes this and is soon playing matchmaker.

The film was a great comic showcase for Coburn. Charles Coburn had been a successful Broadway actor in the period 1910 - 1930s, frequently appearing with his wife in Shakespearean roles. If one goes to the 42nd St. Public Library's second floor there are two portraits of the younger Coburn and his wife in Shakespearean costumes. Then Mrs. Coburn died. Coburn had been (like his contemporary Sidney Greenstreet) rejecting offers to go to Hollywood. He went to Hollywood in 1938 and soon was appearing in good supporting parts, such as YELLOW JACK (he was Dr. Finley) and as the German cancer specialist in IDIOT'S DELIGHT. The parts got larger as time passed: he is the incestuous uncle after Bette Davis (who subsequently finds he's going to die) in IN THIS OUR LIFE. He is the anti-Semitic family head who loathes Peter Lorre in THE CONSTANT NYMPH. He is the sadistic surgeon who cuts off Ronald Reagan's legs as punishment for sleeping with his daughter in KING'S ROWS.

As you can see, most of Coburn's parts in the late 1930s and early 1940s were dramatic, and they were getting bigger, but his comic gifts were rarely pushed. His performance in Preston Sturgis' THE LADY EVE was an exception. George Stevens, a director who (like Leo McCarey) had a background as a comic director with Laurel & Hardy, decided to use him in the atypical part of Benjamin Dingle. The part was a large one, requiring a good actor. Coburn did well with it and created (like Greenstreet would differently with Caspar Gutman in THE MALTESE FALCON) a persona that remained his to the end. Coburn would be playing the common sensible, straight talking grandfather, uncle, or elderly friend in films until he died - occasionally varying the role with a bit of silliness like in MONKEY BUSINESS. Here it resulted in Coburn's Oscar for best supporting actor. He'd been in Hollywood five years by then, but his real beginning in film was here - and it was a fine beginning.

It was Coburn's second movie comedy with Jean Arthur (the first was THE DEVIL AND MISS JONES), and they certainly play well against each other. Similarly Joel McCrae's comic timing is a sure here with Stevens as it was with Preston Sturges. It's funny how, due to McCrae's long career in westerns, people forget all the screwball comedies he made earlier in his career.

Worth seeing

[Joel-61 · 7/10 · 28 August 1999]

While the film drags in places, it's worth seeing for the delightful performances of Charles Coburn and Jean Arthur. And its portrayal of wartime Washington, with its shortages of rooms and males, is illuminating. The film does falter in its mix of screwball comedy and serious romance. But over-all it's enjoyable.

Room for improvement

[Lejink · 5/10 · 4 June 2019]

A rather gentle wartime comedy set in Washington where a housing shortage sees citizens encouraged to make room to share their accommodations and a male shortage sees eight women to one man all over town. When he finds his booked hotel reservation unavailable, retired millionaire Charles Coburn's Mr Dingle character decides to make a little mischief by queue-jumping the sublet of an apartment occupied by Jean Arthur's accounts clerkess Connie Milligan and then a little more by subletting his own sublet to Joel McCrae's soon-to-go-overseas soldier, Joe Carter, without asking Connie's permission. With old Dingle pulling the strings, the already engaged Connie and free and easy Carter are gently drawn together, at the same time disentangling her from her 22 month betrothal to her older, stuffed-shirt fiancé whom she still addresses as "Mr". Although it has its screwball moments, particularly the extended opening scenes where well-organised Connie lays out a rigorous morning timetable for old Dingle to follow, later complicated when he is joined in the cramped apartment by McCrae, the three's comings and goings are neatly choreographed into a series of slapsticky near-misses until the younger couple finally encounter each other. Perhaps I prefer my vintage comedies to be just a little bit more madcap than this but for me the film lacked big laugh-out-loud scenes and I wasn't even sure I liked Coburn's interfering old curmudgeon-come-matchmaker character and all that "Damn the torpedoes" stuff. That said, McCrae and Arthur are good, especially in their scenes together, as the film drifts merrily but a little blandly towards its unsurprisingly upbeat but sentimental and somewhat overdone ending. For me, the movie, while mildly entertaining, lacked the spark and sparkle a Hawks or Capra would have lent to this sort of material and won't stay long in my memory I'm sure.

A revelation

[lionel_3102 · 12 March 2010]

The scene with Jean Arthur and Joel McCrea on the steps of the apartment is more erotic than anything you will see in an "R" rated film today, or probably even an NC-17 film. The desire that they have for each other, and are barely suppressing, is overwhelming. And the lingerie she wears in the last scene is surprisingly suggestive for 1943. This whole film is an amazing piece of work. Much credit goes to legendary director George Stevens. Charles Coburn was always great, but who knew he had the comic chops he shows here? Jean Arthur's voice alone makes her one of sexiest actresses ever in films. She and Joel McCrea are both terribly underrated. This film deserves to be much better known than it is.

Terrific

[flurbage · 10/10 · 17 July 2003]

The comic side of George Stevens at his best, meaning everybody in it is at the top of his or her form. Charles Coburn is irresistible, and Jean Arthur gives one of her best performances; the chemistry between Joel McCrea and Arthur is a

thing of beauty.

Fantastic romantic comedy - with a very steamy scene

[gbill-74877 · 9/10 · 19 July 2018]

I've fallen in love with Jean Arthur. She is funny, cute, romantic, and utterly charming in this film. Her hair and outfits are exquisite. The way she moves her body is so endearing, in everything from getting out of a car, to skipping around her apartment in madcap moments, to dancing. I love the little squeak in her voice and the fact that she was 43 when this film was made. Her reaction to being kissed on the neck on the steps outside, my god. What an incredibly steamy scene.

Oh yeah, and Joel McCrea was great too. :) He plays his part with a perfect touch, drawing on the seriousness of wartime, goofing around with Charles Coburn, and unable to stop a growing attraction to Arthur, but at the same time, with a degree of understatement and reserve. He's a gentleman, but damn, those hands and his moves in that scene on the steps. Did I mention that scene? Another great one is when he gives her a fancy travel bag and then shows her all of its various features - they are both just so natural, and one feels their interest in each other simmering in their terrible nearness. He accidentally marks his nose sniffing a makeup container, and it was quite clever of director George Stevens to leave it on his face for as long as he did. I also loved when they both secretly hoped her fiancé (Richard Gaines) wouldn't call by 8 pm, so that they could go out together instead.

Charles Coburn is quite a character in this film as well, impish and bold, while cleverly playing matchmaker between the two. The banter between Coburn and McCrea is as good as the banter each have with Arthur. Coburn's performance was worthy of the best supporting actor Oscar he won. Stevens has a great sense of flow, balances the comedic and romantic elements perfectly, and gives us lots of little eye candy on top of it. The wartime song at the end was a nice touch too. Highly recommended.

All the right ingredients, but...

[vincentlynch-moonoi · 7/10 · 8 March 2016]

I guess I'm out of sync on this one. This film gets high marks from most sources, but not for me. Yet, despite being the genre of film I really enjoy, and despite having a cast I very much like, I don't care much for this film.

Jean Arthur is one of my favorite comedic actresses from that era (although she could do drama, as well). Charles Coburn is one of my very favorite (usually) character actors (he stars here) from that era. And while I can't say that Joel McCrea is one of my favorites, I very much like him in his non-Western earlier roles. So, it's not the acting that I have a problem with here.

Some younger viewers may not even understand the premise, but in war time Washington (WWII) there was a tremendous housing shortage. This film plays on that history, as the 3 principal characters ends up sharing one apartment. A funny premise. And, of course, Arthur and McCrea fall in love. And, of course, the matchmaker is sweet old Coburn.

Funny premise...that seems to go on forever. It's predictable. It just drags.

I'm not saying it's a bad movie. Perhaps a bit mundane. To each his own...but this one is not on my DVD shelf.

The romance is stronger than the comedy

[chriskh · 8/10 · 13 April 2000]

This starts unpromisingly (or was I just in the wrong mood?) with slapstick banana-skin-style gags which, however well done, show their age. Jean Arthur looks unassuming compared with her strong-girl tomboyish appearances in the Capra classics. But come Joel McCrea and the burgeoning love (at first resisted) between him and Arthur, and she shows a vulnerability and a range of expression that round out our knowledge of an already well-loved artist.

Charles Coburn, too, after the comic-strip cackhandedness of the first scenes, grows into an enjoyably human old rascal and Joel McCrea, blasé and hardbitten to begin with, develops into a fine romantic hero. The ending (will they, won't they?)recalls the end of the Cary Grant/Irene Dunne classic "The Awful Truth", and if I say that McCrea and Arthur do not pale by comparison, then I could hardly give higher praise than that.

Good but not great

[trpdean · 7/10 · 15 September 2005]

I expected a much funnier, faster-paced comedy.

The leads are wonderful at comedy - Joel McCrea in the humorous parts of say, Foreign Correspondent is great. Charles Coburn is wonderful here. And Jean Arthur is so very deft, her voice capable of such expression.

Yet I found much of the movie formulaic (the obligatory trip by everyone to the police station or the courthouse that we saw in dozens of movies from the 1930s: the oaf of a fiancé, the wall or curtain separating those in love as they speak to each other and the camera zooms in, the crowd of unlikely people cheering them on ...).

This is very slow, and the romance consists primarily in just putting the two leads together and having them speak s l o w l y while deliberately looking away from each other. Aside from Joel McCrea's looks, for the life of me, I cannot think of a single reason why an engaged woman falls in love with him in a few days. He says virtually nothing, he does virtually nothing. The fiancé must be made oafish in order to show McCrea as the only alternative.

The gags are often repeated and belabored too long.

The main characters seem to either be silent or speak at half speed through much of the movie.

So much of this movie feels stolen - and some doesn't make sense.

*** SPOILERS **** Long after McCrea and Arthur have spoken of their love for one another, and McCrea has proposed - why is it that when the oafish fiancé is gone, Arthur and McCrea must pretend for the next 26 hours that their wedding is a mere formality to be followed by annulment? I don't get it at all. It makes no sense. It just seems to be put in there so that the director can AGAIN delay the consummation of their love. But it's idiotic.

**** SPOILERS **** I blame George Stevens. The basic plot is fine for a wonderful screwball comedy - but this movie lacks comic flair in direction, lacks the imagination for the small bits that a viewer loves to see in a comedy, and its scenes that run too long.

Compare this with, say, the wonderful charming memorable nonsense in breathtaking comedies that had come BEFORE it: e.g., The Awful Truth (from which this movie steals much), Midnight, One Hour With You, Hands Across the Table, It Happened One Night (from which this movie steals much), The Smiling Lieutenant, The Princess Comes Across, His Girl Friday, Dinner at 8:00, Love Me Tonight, Topper, 5th Avenue Girl, The Gay Divorcée, Bachelor Mother, Easy Living, True Confession, Roberta, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Top Hat, Trouble in Paradise, You Can't Take it With You, Private Lives, My Man Godfrey, Bringing Up Baby -- -- and you'll agree that they're all superior. It's a pity because I'd love to have loved this.

This is a well-made but ponderous copy of far better comedies.

Brilliant romantic sitcom

[wisewebwoman · 9/10 · 4 March 2007]

This is a one of a kind effort from George Stephens who was to really somber up when he came back from photographing the devastation and after shocks of WWII, especially the concentration camps. What he witnessed there kicked the humour clear out of the man.

Jean Arthur and Joel Mccrae are amazing in this, ably abetted by Charles Coburn who got an Oscar for best supporting actor.

The premise is the very real housing shortage in Washington during the Second World War and how Jean Arthur sublets a portion of her apartment to Charles who in turn secretly sublets his sublet to Joel, almost on a whim.

Jean is a very organized person and one of the many jokes in the film centres around her schedules, bathroom, showering, coffee making, etc. in the morning, unwittingly foiled by a bumbling Charles.

Sparks fly once Joel enters the picture. And a very real eroticism is generated. Witness the gift and touching of the leather travelling case and the scene on the steps which goes right up there in the 10 Top Romantic scenes of all time. And the scene of eye-talk at the nightclub in front of Jean's fiancé. Breathtaking. Joel just can't keep his hands off her.

9 out of 10. An absolutely splendid romp and boy that choir of the homeless at the end. And some of the timing gags. Not to be missed for the fans of the forties B&W's.

Mr Dingle

[btreakle · 7/10 · 17 July 2020]

This movie considering when made was quie amusing. Great acting with predictable scenes but still fun to watch. Love the old ones

"I missed two Sundays with Superman once and I've never felt right since."

[utgard14 · 8/10 · 19 October 2016]

Delightful comedy classic from Columbia Pictures and director George Stevens. During World War II there was a housing shortage in many big cities, particularly Washington D.C. This is the backdrop for the film's zany plot that has retired businessman Charles Coburn renting half of Jean Arthur's apartment, then turning around and renting half of his half to soldier Joel McCrea, and trying to play matchmaker for McCrea and Arthur.

Jean Arthur has rarely been more cute and more likable than she is here. Joel McCrea shows the same kind of charm and comic timing that he displayed in his Preston Sturges comedies. Charles Coburn is, of course, terrific ("Damn the torpedoes! Full steam ahead!"). He deservedly won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance (the only win out of six Oscar nominations the film received). It's a great movie with a witty script and a trio of stars that have wonderful chemistry together. Not the most well-known comedy from the period perhaps but I think it's one of the best.

The More the Merrier

[StevenKeys · 6/10 · 21 December 2022]

Charles Coburn plays a government contractor who sweet-talks stuffy bureaucrat Jean Arthur into sub-letting part of her apartment to he, then serviceman Joel McCrea in a Washington, DC capital pushed to the limit on War-time housing.

Chuck is just adorable, the Macon born thespian (1877) awarded a Best Supporting Oscar, though, he's clearly the lead. With all due respect to Jean & Joel, Columbia could've cast their parts with any number of contract cuties but Charles Coburn is one in a million. If, as Winston Churchill said, Mrs Miniver was worth a fleet of "battleships," then Benjamin "Torpedo" Dingle most certainly rated a flotilla of efficiencies.

Director George Stevens lets his film drag (104m), Arthur's "Connie," though with prospects (she's got great gams), is turned into a blubbering, needy mess in complete opposite of the independent, career-minded gal seen in opening frames. Still, CC's performance is so pleasing you won't find it difficult to stomach all the silliness (3/4).

The Definition Of A "Trifling Comedy"

[sddavis63 · 4/10 · 7 January 2008]

The words "trifling comedy" seem somewhat cliché and unhelpful, but having watched "The More The Merrier," they also seem to fit this movie to a "t." In the historical context in which this movie was made (at the height of the Second World War) I'm sure this represented a welcome diversion from the standard war movie or patriotic binge that would have been most common. And yet, despite the high regard in which it's held, it really didn't do a lot for me. I watched it right through, and didn't find it difficult to watch at all. I also didn't find anything here that would make me want to watch it again, though.

This movie is cute rather than funny, and sweetly innocent. One shudders to think what Hollywood would do today with this story of two men sharing an apartment with a young woman during a housing shortage! The leads (Jean Arthur as Connie, Joel McCrae as Joe, and Charles Coburn as Mr. Dingle) all give good performances. Coburn himself is quite funny in a few places, and Connie's timetable for keeping order in the apartment is worthy of a few laughs. Aside from that, however, the movie isn't outrageously funny. The story is also quite predictable, and once the lead characters are introduced, there's really never any doubt how this story is going to turn out.

I think this is quite over-rated, although worthy of wasting a couple of hours with. 4/10