Always a Bride

ALWAYS A BRIDE (1940) stars Rosemary Lane, a couple years removed from her late-1930s musical successes with her sisters, and a little-known George Reeves, early in his Hollywood career and a decade before he'd become famous as television's Superman. They're surrounded by a cast of D-list actors in this third-rate production.

The story is weak and the ending, coming only an hour into the film, caught me off-guard. I was expecting the story to continue a little further and was surprised to see it "conclude" where it did. The film feels more like an episode of a television (or radio) series. It's a short story, not a novel. Not quite enough material for a feature-length movie.

Reeves is charming, though, as a sweet-talking idler who first must win back his sweetheart and then finds himself in the middle of a mayoral race.

Rosemary Lane didn't have the kind of Hollywood success that her sister Priscilla enjoyed, but she's always been a personal favorite of mine. Her movie career didn't go very far without her sisters and I would've liked to see her in more (and better) films.

ALWAYS A BRIDE is pretty inconsequential. A cheap quickie with the minimum allowable entertainment value, buoyed only by George Reeves's charm. The movie is really only of interest to fans of Reeves or Lane.