Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Awesome Movie

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

If you're interested in the topic at hand, you should just watch it and judge yourself because the reviews have gone very biased by people that didn't even watch it and just hate (or love) the creator. I liked it, it was well written, narrated, and directed and it was about a topic that interests me.

It's a battle of the sexes 50's style with the expected outcome but Bette Davis shows her light side ably supported by a stellar cast. Since comedy wasn't Bette's long suit Warners filled out the cast with some of the premier light comic actors in the business. Robert Montgomery is ideally cast in the sort of facile smart alack that was his signature in his MGM days. He and Bette have a sand-papery chemistry that works fine but it seems that she might have had more rapport with Cary Grant or Clark Gable, two other masters of this kind of breezy fare. She had actually requested either Jack Carson or Dennis Morgan to costar but both were tied up with other commitments, Morgan might have been a stretch but the part would have fit the great Carson like a glove. Surrounding them are two unique masters of the wry line reading-Fay Bainter and Mary Wickes. They add enormously to the film as do Tom Tully, as the bride's flummoxed father, James Burke as a photographer very fond of cheesecake snapshots and especially Betty Lynn in a scene stealing performance as mischief making younger sister Boo. She is an impish delight and handily takes scenes away from her more experienced cast mates. You have to keep an eagle eye out but during the pre-wedding scene Debbie Reynolds makes her wordless screen bow sitting on a sofa. Blink and you'll miss her.Spoiled somewhat by a cop out traditional ending that negates a great deal of what has come before but until that point this is a highly entertaining movie from Bette's late Warner Bros. period. Indeed in the dark days of Winter Meeting and Beyond the Forest this gives Miss Davis a breather to show off her new look hairdo and wardrobe in a slight but fun movie.

Coming just before the blockbuster ALL ABOUT EVE this little gem shows another comedic side of Bette Davis without going over the top. She's harried and trying to be pleasant to all including an old flame who shows up inconveniently. In a sense, it's the classic tale of the rubes versus the swells but gently and sympathetically told. Robert Montgomery matches Miss Davis sarcasm for sarcasm and the always welcome Mary Wickes rides herd on the various bickering characters. When she refers to the home they're to use as a "McKinley horror" one knows that all are in for more than a little restoration. If it won't have you rolling in the aisles, it's consistently amusing. An able cast of primarily character actors contribute their very really talents (Tom Tully and Faye Bainter are real and whimsical at the same time.) and the basic love story that drives the action isn't much to concern the viewer. If the rural nature gets pushed a bit too far it works well within the context of the plot. And this marks Miss Davis' second trip while ice skating, indeed there are moments when her character, Linda, is more than suggestive of her role in The Man Who Came to Dinner.A pleasant time for all with a friendly cast who try, and succeed, to find as much in the diverting material as there is.

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.

When one says that an actor is good in every film they are in, no film personifies this more than Bretaigne Windust's 1948 film "June Bride" in which Bette Davis and Robert Montgomery star as former lovers and boss/subordinate. Davis plays Linda Gilman, a no-nonsense editor of a Home and Life type magazine in New York. Robert Montgomery is Carey Jackson, her new writer and former lover. Three years ago the two were almost ready to get married when he got cold feet and walked out on her. Through zany mishaps he ends up working for her three years later, and the two have not lost their attraction to one another. Linda packs up her staff for Indiana to do a cover story for their June issue, covering a wedding in small-town Midwest, U.S.A. Once there, they have to completely transform the house and the people in it, because they do not meet the cosmopolitan standards of these New Yorkers. Along the way, Carey decides to mix things up a bit when he discovers that the bride is marrying the brother of her ex-fiancée, and her sister is actually in love with the groom-to-be. (Get all that?) Complicating things is the fact that Linda and Carey are falling all over each other, rekindling their romance, which is getting in the way of the task at hand."June Bride" is supposed to be a madcap comedy, but it's just a boring mess. As stated before, there are some actors that are good in every film, and Bette Davis is one of those actors. Her performance was excellent, but the film that she was forced to work in was just plain bad, and her persona in the film hints that she knows it. Robert Montgomery, who is all slapstick in the film without a hint of charm, has absolutely no chemistry with Davis, which leads to a very flat film. The story was dumb, and not charming in the least. Really, the only interesting thing about the film is the director's first name. There's actually not a lot more to say about the film, except that it's too bad that "June Bride" wasn't better, because it was rare for a couple of reasons: It was one of the few Bette Davis comedies and it was one of the few Bette Davis films I had not yet seen. Unfortunately it probably should have stayed that way. 4/10.--Shelly