The More the Merrier
Writer: Caroline Farah, Zac Hug
Director: Peter Benson
Cast: Rachel Boston, Brendan Penny, Lucia Walters, Aadila Dosani, Carmel Amit, Iris Quinn, Donna Benedicto, Jerry Wasserman
Rachel Boston (Debbie Macomber's Joyful Mrs. Miracle) plays Dr. Alice Roger, a nomadic emergency room doctor who cares deeply (but briefly) for every single person she meets. How selfless is she? She volunteers to work every Christmas Eve, so she can give doctors with families the night off and so she can ensure that anyone who enters the ER that night will have as merry an experience as possible. Otherwise, Alice is kind of a ghost in town.
This does not set well with Brian (A Novel Noel's Brendan Penny), the new doctor in town. Won't passing out cookies and hanging up decorations get in the way of emergency medicine? After all, there's a snowstorm coming! Brian's a total Scrooge, so much so that Alice literally asks, "What do you have against Christmas?" Truly, the most damning accusation one can make on the Hallmark Channel.
Alice assures Brian that they have nothing to worry about. Christmas Eve is slow, especially when it comes to delivering babies. No babies are born on Christmas Eve! Surely the fact that The More the Merrier introduces multiple pregnant women in its first act won't come into play before the end of the movie!
Home for the Holidays: We're nestled in the town of Pine Ridge, one of those snow-covered towns with a low skyline that seems plopped into the center of a gorgeous, frosty wonderland. At least there doesn't seem to be a mountain range looming in the distance, which is another trait of seemingly every opening shot of every Hallmark movie nowadays. Anyway — The More the Merrier gives Pine Ridge a real sense of place and community. Nowhere is this more evident than in the local bakery, the curiously named Cookie Glory.
'Twas the Night Before This Movie: You want an easy way to info dump? After introducing a character, have someone else provide the bio with an OMG tone. Like this: "Dr. Brian. Davis? The renowned cardiologist Dr. Brian Davis? The one they're going to put up billboards about?"
They Brought Presence: Any time Carmel Amit shows up, be it in last year's The Santa Class or Virgin River (a show I've never seen, but I know that 80% of Netflix subscribers have), she's gonna bring that salty, no-nonsense energy. I welcome her presence on Hallmark.
Ho Ho Ho: You know an ER is having a rough night when you hear this on the intercom: "Dr. Rogers to labor and delivery, but ... the makeshift waiting room one."
Exactly As Advertised: The title is a little too broad. It makes sense once the baby boom conceit starts, but that's over a half hour into the movie. And by "conceit," I mean an actual graphic labeling a baby as "Christmas Baby #1." That's a concept! Lean into that! Call the movie Santa Babies or Holiday Baby Boom or something!
The More the Merrier is a bit of an outlier in the Hallmark lineup. It weaves multiple supporting stories together, however ones all unified by the unexpected Christmas Eve baby boom plotline. If you go into it expecting the usual Hallmark fare, you're going to get a little bit of that and a lot of other stuff. That's good, as it makes the movie ... well, still reliably predictable but a little more surprising.
There's real character work being done here, with Doctors Alice and Brian. Yes, their views on emergency medicine are quaintly opposite (she loves Christmas, he doesn't!), but the movie explores their viewpoints separately, to great dramatic effect. Rachel Boston does a fantastic job keeping Alice's motives close to her chest, masking them with sincere holiday cheer, until the time is right to give the audience a tiny peek at her soul.
The only problem with The More the Merrier is what I call The Screensaver Test. Hallmark movies are made to be watched actively and passively; that's why they run 24/7. While yes, they should be enjoyable movies if you're paying attention, they also need to get the job done of providing a hit of holiday cheer every time you glance at the TV while wrapping presents or chatting with visitors or shopping on your phone. While all the scenes outside of the hospital provide that cozy Hallmark warmth, the rest of the movie emits more of a Grey's Anatomy aesthetic. Your mileage may vary!
If you haven't already, consider supporting worker-owned media by subscribing to Pop Heist. We are ad-free and operating outside the algorithm, so all dollars go directly to paying the staff members and writers who make articles like this one possible.
