June Bride (1948)

The June Bride is actually married earlier to make the June issue of the magazine of which Bette Davis is the editor. She's no Meryl Streep of "The Devil Wears Prada" personality; In fact, she's a very congenial lady, except when ex-beau Robert Montgomery is around, still stung from the fact that he stood her up for a dinner date. "After three years, I figured you weren't coming", she slyly tells him, then cringes when she learns that he's been assigned by their publisher to become her newest writer. She's off to Indiana for a homey wedding where the plump mother of the bride needs constant massages to fit into her new dress, the father keeps the cork off the apple cider and ice inside it to ferment it, the sister of the bride is in love with the groom, and the bride is actually in love with the groom's brother. ...And you think us city folk live soap opera lives!!! This is Bette Davis's first comedy in six years, and she certainly knows how to throw off a witty line or two. She's given a fine sparring partner in Montgomery who did a few of these screwball comedies over at MGM during his heyday there and after war movies and film noir needed a lighter role. Surrounding them on the staff are cynical Fay Bainter and wise-cracking Mary Wickes, a bust of Julius Caesar's given to the bride's mother (Marjorie Bennett) on her wedding day which the husband (Tom Tully) secretly hates, and the sisters (Barbara Bates and Betty Lynn) who aren't exactly loyal to each other. Country folk aren't all butter churns and hog-calling contests, we learn, and the city folk have a thing or two to learn.This is a battle of the sexes comedy that only seems to be out to prove that a woman with a career is not a woman at all, and it is obvious where Montgomery wants Davis to be if he can get her to the alter. Like other career women in Warner Brothers movies (Kay Francis in "Man Wanted", Ruth Chatterton in "Female", Barbara Stanwyck in "Christmas in Connecticut"), Davis finds she can't have both worlds. Yet, you still get the impression that there will still be a tiger underneath the kitten with an apron should Montgomery get his way, 'cause after all, she's Bette Davis, and a tiger never changes her stripes.Yet, in spite of all that, this is still very amusing, and there are some truly funny moments, especially Montgomery's consumption of apple cider and his reaction to what he's doing when he wakes up. The sisters are totally different in personalities, and when Montgomery learns what the sister of the bride is really up to, his reaction is eyebrow raising. It's ironic to see Bennett as the country mother here, recalling her performance as Victor Buono's cockney mama in "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?" where she didn't share any scenes with Davis. A very young Sandra Gould ("Bewitched's" second Gladys Kravitz) is very funny in her brief role as Davis's boss's secretary, while a young Debbie Reynolds (who went through her own Bette Davis wedding in "A Catered Affair"), is seen in a "don't blink or you'll miss it" moment as a wedding guest, one of the bride's friends.

I can't agree with previous comments raving about BETTE DAVIS and her, in my opinion, failed technique with comedy, nor ROBERT MONTGOMERY's lusterless and coy performance as the sort of cocky and arrogant snob he usually played in romantic comedies dealing with the battle of the sexes. He's at his least appealing here.Gloomy looking Bette looks as if she'd rather smack him than kiss him and gives a very dour performance, heavy with sarcasm (too heavy for comedy). And Montgomery looks as though he despises not only the fact that she is a career woman--but a woman he can't possibly think of as a mate. Put the two of them together in a trite, weak script that is supposed to be a "light as air comedy" and you get messy results.Bette is supposed to be planning the next issue of her magazine around a June wedding and using a typical family for the June issue. She's smartly dressed and coiffed but still has that matronly appearance that makes her unsuitable for what is supposed to be a light romantic comedy. Nor does she play the part in a lighthearted way. None of it is anything more than a waste of time. Even the supporting cast has trouble making anything out of a script that settles for a sexist ending to resolve the bad situation between Bette and Bob.FAY BAINTER tries hard, as do BETTY LINLEY, TOM TULLY and others, but it's a hopeless mess, unfunny and irritatingly performed by the star duo so that one becomes impatient for that supposedly happy ending in which the two stars stop fighting long enough to exchange loving glances.You'd think that after the whopping that WINTER MEETING took from the critics, Bette would refuse to work with stage director Bretaigne Windust again. Well, it's another loser. She's too heavy-handed with the comedy aspects and Robert Montgomery is no help, insufferable as her co-star.

June Bride has some fine moments, but it never really gets going as a first-rate comedy, mostly because of Bette Davis' stiff and somewhat dour performance. She and Robert Montgomery have very little chemistry. Poor Bob has to do all of the work, which leads to an exaggerated performance at times, but at least he brings some energy to the film and saves it from being a complete disaster. Davis looks like she didn't want to be making the picture. Unlike Stanwyck or Hepburn, she seems incapable of moving back and forth between drama and comedy. If Montgomery had been teamed with one of those two, or with Jean Arthur, Claudette Colbert, or Myrna Loy, this could have been a small classic. The writing is very smart at times, even though the story itself is fairly predictable and a bit too cute. There are some excellent comic moments, including two great ones with Tom Tully's Mr. Brinker. The film has a good pace, apart from Ms. Davis' leaden performance, and the direction is efficient and sensible. Given the number of great comedies from the 30s and 40s one can live without seeing June Bride, but it can suffice in a pinch.

As a Hoosier who has lived most of my life in New York, who enjoys both Bette Davis and Robert Montgomery, and was in the mood for a romantic comedy (my local theater had sold out on the Bullock-Grant comedy this evening), I thought this was good. There are a number of funny scenes (including the mistaken understanding regarding the "bust"). I do grow a little tired sometimes of the absurdity of everyone marrying within a few hours on seeing someone they like - very much a 1930s-1940s movie fiction (and never reality) - yet I kind of hoped it would happen here. In reference to the comment below about Robert Montgomery taking a 15 year old over his lap - she's actually supposed to be 18! And I therefore thought he had mixed feelings in doing it!The dialogue here is often very extraordinary - the writer goes on flights of fancy that will make you want to rewind! This is also not a movie whose ending will please the feminists - but that's life. All in all, a good movie with a good plot, fine performances, and enough quite funny scenes to make it enjoyable.