Film

The Money Pit

Name: The Money Pit
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Released: 1986
Cast: Tom Hanks, Shelley Long, Alexander Godunov, Maureen Stapleton, Joe Mantegna

Comedy
Light-hearted

A couple's dream house becomes a financial and emotional black hole in this 1986 comedy where every renovation spawns new disasters. Tom Hanks and Shelley Long navigate slapstick chaos and marital strain with charm and timing. It's fundamentally about watching competent people lose control, funny because the stakes feel real alongside the absurdity.

TMDb rating

3.3

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you enjoy broad, physical slapstick where a sturdy comic duo keeps getting battered by a house that refuses to behave, and you like your farce warm enough that the couple's bickering feels affectionate.

Skip it if you want sharp, dialogue-driven wit or a restrained comedy, since much of the humour runs on pratfalls, collapsing floors and escalating disaster that some viewers find wearing over ninety minutes.

What it asks of you: It runs about ninety-one minutes and moves at a brisk clip, asking you to laugh at repeated mishaps rather than follow intricate plotting, with the romance kept light and in the background.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Beetlejuice1988

A newly dead couple haunts their own home with increasingly elaborate schemes. It captures the same escalating chaos and oddball contractor energy, with Michael Keaton stealing every scene he's in with manic glee.

But The gothic Tim Burton aesthetic and supernatural plot are a tonal shift from the grounded domestic nightmare of The Money Pit.

Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House1948

Cary Grant and Myrna Loy buy a rambling Connecticut estate that becomes a bottomless money pit. The template The Money Pit was built from—same joke, sharper wit, and Grant's exasperation is a masterclass.

But The pace and dialogue belong entirely to 1948. It will feel slow and theatrical if you're used to contemporary rhythm.

Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House poster

National Lampoon's Vacation1983

Chevy Chase's dogged determination to see his family through escalating disaster mirrors Hanks trying to save his house. That particular American optimism colliding with reality is the emotional core both films share.

But The humour is broader and meaner-spirited. This one is happier watching its hero suffer than The Money Pit is.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Money Pit

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

After Hours1985

Both are about watching a basically decent person lose control of their environment in real time, with chaos mounting in escalating, often absurd ways. But where Money Pit finds charm in the disaster, After Hours finds dread.

Martin Scorsese's strangest film: a man trapped in downtown Manhattan for one night as every single thing goes catastrophically wrong. It's The Money Pit's spiritual cousin—escalating chaos, mounting dread, a protagonist trying to salvage the evening—but transplanted to a surreal, urban nightmare where the joke gets darker as it goes.

But It's deliberately disorienting and hostile. The humour is creeping and unsettling rather than warm. Griffin Dunne's desperation eventually stops being funny.

3 Men and a Baby1987

Three guys in over their heads learning to cope with impossible circumstances. The same cast-chemistry-carries-chaos formula, with Leonard Nimoy and Steve Guttenberg providing equally solid support to the lead's panic.

But It's sweeter and more sentimental. If you want the acidic bite of watching a relationship tested, this one goes soft.

Ghostbusters1984

A group of ordinary people facing supernatural catastrophe they can't control, played with such likability that you're rooting for them despite the escalating impossibility. The same 'competent person in an incompetent situation' DNA.

But It's a blockbuster with genuine stakes and action set-pieces. The Money Pit stays domestic and intimate; this one opens up.

It Happened One Christmas1977

Shelley Long and Wayne Newton in a romantic comedy about a couple rebuilding their lives together. It's lighter and more straightforward, but it shows Long's gift for playing exasperation with warmth.

But It's a made-for-TV movie. The production values and pacing reflect that era and budget very clearly.

Bachelor Party1984

Tom Hanks before he became Tom Hanks, in a raucous comedy that shows his ability to be goofy and ridiculous while keeping the character's essential decency intact. Pre-fame Hanks energy.

But It's raunchier and crueller. The Money Pit has warmth; this one is pure '80s excess and doesn't apologize for it.

Splash1984

Hanks and Daryl Hannah in a romantic comedy that balances fantastical premise with genuine emotional stakes. The same quality of Hanks playing a regular guy trying to make impossible things work.

But The mermaid plot belongs to a different movie entirely. If you want domestic realism, this fantasy element won't land.

Quick Change1990

Bill Murray, Randy Quaid, and Geena Davis pull off a bank heist and then spend the whole film trying to get to the airport. It's about ordinary people thwarted by systems and circumstance, often hilariously.

But It's darker and more cynical about urban life. The Money Pit has optimism underneath; this one doesn't.

The Poseidon Adventure1972

Both films are fundamentally about a couple's relationship tested by their physical environment becoming hostile. In Money Pit it's funny; in Poseidon it's tragic. But the structure—obstacle after obstacle, the couple growing closer or fracturing under pressure—is identical.

An all-star disaster film about a group of people trapped in an upside-down ship, fighting their way through collapsing architecture and impossible odds. The spectacle is magnificent, but the emotional core is about a couple (Gene Hackman and Shelley Winters) refusing to quit on each other as everything literally falls apart around them.

But It's a 1970s disaster blockbuster with dated special effects and soap-opera plotting. The tone whipsaws between camp and sentimentality. It's long and can feel bloated.

You've Got Mail1998

Both feature Hanks playing a fundamentally decent man trying to keep his romantic relationship afloat while external forces—renovations and contractors in one, corporate economics in the other—threaten to sink everything. But where Money Pit embraces slapstick, Mail embraces yearning.

Tom Hanks opposite Meg Ryan in a film about two people falling in love while their real lives fall apart around them. It's a romance, but it's suffused with the anxiety of displacement, economic precarity, and the conflict between what you want and what the world allows. Hanks as a man trying to make things work across competing obligations.

But It's a straightforward romantic comedy with a happy ending. If you're looking for the frustration and absurdity of Money Pit, this one smooths everything into sentiment and will feel slick and false.