Evening star., 1948-11-12

June bIlQe, llle ilcW ioAiAesA
comedy at the Warner could have
been a pretty funny satire on these
magazines which use words to ex-
plain what their picture stories
mean. 1t could have been, but 1t
isn't. Instead, it chooses to be one
of those semi l-sophisticated tales In
which the professional playboy talks
career girl into marriage.
This, everyone knows, Is routine
stuff and while Warmers dress 1t
up with Bette Davis and Robert
Montgomery. it still is just another
version of the same yarn.
It's novelty lies altogether in the
fact that Miss Davis does not play
gay girls very often. The truth Is
she has played them so rarely that
this one has a note of grimness
which looks like hangover from
her cinema past
The merriment which is injected
into June Bride is therefore pretty
much the work of Montgomery and
some of the lesser members of the
cast who join him in certain of the
scripts jokes.
X X X X
= June Bride" is based upon a
reasonably funny idea. if only the
idea were carried out.
1t presents Miss Davis as one Of
those sculptured icebergs who edit
Women's magazines. Because it is
June in January in these forward
looking periodicals, she and staff
of experts must fly to a snoW-bound
Indiana hamlet to get wedding
story for the June issue.
Dressing up an Indiana January
to look like June is no problem at
all for Miss Davis and her experts.
Her dilemma is what to do about
Montgomery, footlooSe foreign
correspondent. who is assigned to
her as writing man.
He is not only difficult to deal
with professionally, but even more
SO on the personal level. Three years
before, the frigid editor and her
overly warm-hearted writing man
were hazardously close to matri-
mony. He saved them at that time
by simply flying to Berlin one night,
but now he is back and in an en-
ttrely new amOrouS mood.
He is f1agrantly not the fellow to
take along on a high-speed assign
ment When he feels cozy, as he
does on this occasion, he would be
a menace to a woman twice as frigid
as Miss, Davis if the two of them
were alone on a glacier.
The chief harm done to the po-
tentialities of June Bride" is that
Montgomery pursuit of Miss Davis
is largely vocal. AS two writer's, or
one editor and one writer are likely
to do, they talk love to extinction
and audiences into periodic apathy.
The best parts of the picture are
those in which others intrude upon
the basic romance The Indiana
family, which is staging the we'd
ding, has some amusing stock fig
ureS. One Of these is a younger sis
ter who gives Montgomery a splen-I
did idea for busting the. wedding
program wide open: another is a
father who hides his hard cider like
the hero of Lost Weekend and
a couple of potential local bride
grooms who react quite comically to
Montgomery's reckless advice to the
loVelorn.
In their simple honey way, the
Indianians contribute more to the
honest merriment of June Bride"
than do the sophisticated New
Workers who come to make them
famous to circulation of 100000.
Among the minor performers Gre
ating this effect are Mary Wickes,
Betty Lynn, Raymond Roe, and the
always reliable Fay BANTER.
They get a large number of
laughs in June Bride" but not
enough to deceive anyone that there
still Is not an uproarious screen
comedy in Dipture Deri0dicalS