YouHeart I gave it a 7.5 out of 10

Steineded How sad is this?

SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

ActuallyGlimmer The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

mark.waltz 1850's New Orleans society was filled with gracious living. Well dressed women of the upper-crust, Scarlet O'Hara's everyone of them. Bette Davis coveted both the role of Scarlet in "Gone With the Wind" and Miss Julie in the adaptation of a Broadway play, ending up settling for the later (and get second Oscar), but even without the color awarded to the film version of Margaret Mitchell's novel, still ended up with a classic.Pretty much soiling men's pants as she walks into a bank, Miss Julie is a force to be reckoned with. A banker's meeting is not as important as the choosing of her dress for a lavish ball. Of course, thus is the famous red dress that scandalizes all of New Orleans. The lack of color here doesn't matter because Davis makes the audience feel the red rather than see it, and that is acting. It's as scandalous as Scarlet dancing with Rhett while wearing widow black.But like Scarlett, there is much more than just the obvious selfishness of her Southern belle image. There is the heart and soul of a woman, searching for the right opportunity to reveal her humanity. The men in her life are Henry Fonda and George Brent, and who she ends up with is guided not only by the stars but by historical events as well. The major plot twist concerns an outbreak of yellow fever which threatens the entire population including Fonda.With Fay Bainter (in an Oscar winning supporting role) brilliant as her long-suffering, concerned aunt, ironically also nominated against Davis for the drama "White Banners". Donald Crisp, Spring Byington and Margaret Lindsay also among the supporting cast. Lindsay is particularly important as the Yankee lady from New York City who helps bring out Julie's mobility after years of only thinking of herself. The strong direction of Davis by the legendary William Wyler (probably the only director who knew how to tame Davis) keeps everything moving.

robert-259-28954 I watched Gone With The Wind a hundred times before seeing this classic film on TCM. Now I know where it came from! I stopped counting the things they ripped off from "Jezebel" after 10. Putting it mildly, GWTW was nothing more than 'Jezebel' in color, with different actors. I didn't think that Bette Davis would be such a great Southern belle, but she was, and in spades. That said, in the fullness of time, Vivien Leigh would most be remembered, and her Scarlett was one for the ages, the definitive role for the definitive actor. But we should never forget where the seeds of "Gone With The Wind Came From"... the back lot of Warner Bros.

Edgar Allan Pooh . . . misbegotten soap opera, GONE WITH THE WIND, since JEZEBEL courageously blows the whistle on the Evils of Black Slavery while WIND set back American Race Relations at least a century (prompting umpteen lynchings, to boot). Even this summer, 76 years after that ill WIND first blew by us, GWTW fans are waltzing into Black Churches attempting to prove that Black Lives Don't Matter; anyone who can read the opening scroll of GWTW without standing up to scream at those Treason-praising lies needs to "self-deport" from America forthwith! Warner Bros. filmed JEZEBEL in Black & White, because Slavery and Race Relations are Black & White issues, hardly fit to be gussied up and glossed over in Technicolor. JEZEBEL features the top movie star of the late 1930s--Bette Davis--because of the serious nature of these issues (JEZEBEL producer Warner Bros. felt no need to cast a mentally unhealthy chick in the lead to garner unmerited publicity). Viewers cannot help seeing JEZEBEL's two mansions without thinking of the thousands of Racist Slave Floggings, brutal "wings-clipping" amputations, and "routine" bleeding-finger cotton-picking marathon work days slaving in the fields that made these germ-infested palaces possible. Henry Fonda's "Pres" character makes sure that his fellow Southerners know not only that theirs is a Lost Cause, but he explains WHY it is lost (unlike Clark Gable's immoral airhead GWTW playboy, Rhett Butler).

vincentlynch-moonoi First off, to those who criticize comparisons made between this film and "Gone With The Wind". Too bad. Such comparisons are valid. Stop and think -- Bette Davis' Julie is not unlike Scarlett in many ways: frivolous, but when it really counts bucks up and faces overwhelming odds to do what is needed. Take the speech by Henry Fonda's Preston about why the South would lose a civil war...it could have been written by the same screenwriter as Clark Gable's Rhett's speech on the same topic. And, after all, this film was a plum to Bette Davis when she didn't get "GWTW". Some people confuse elements of this film (along with "Band Of Angels") to "GWTW".But there are two things about this film that make it pale in comparison to "GWTW". First, from beginning to end, it pretty much depressing. A leading female character prone to plotting and tantrums. As the tide turns in her life toward the negative, she falls into mild depression. Buck (George Brent) is an ass who constantly engages in duels. And then, yellow fever hits and those who fall ill are sent to a swampy island to die (eventually including the leading male actor -- Henry Fonda). Nothing upbeat here.Second, there's hardly a sympathetic character in the film, making it very difficult to really like almost any of the actors. Bette Davis' character redeems herself only in the last 5 minutes of the film (although that is not to say that Miss Davis' performance is any less fine than many of her others). Henry Fonda's character (and his acting) probably come off best. George Brent's character is so unlikable that I didn't even enjoy Brent's performance (and usually I do). Faye Bainter (as Aunt Belle) and Donald Crisp (as the doctor) are likable enough, but don't get a lot of screen time; they're simply a tool to move the main plot forward. It's nice to see Spring Byington and Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, but they have little to do here.I often enjoy a film in "glorious black and white", but here the difference between the brilliant color of "GWTW" and the drab black and white of "Jesebel" (filmed just one year apart) seems to characterize the memorability of "GWTW" and the comparatively forgotten "Jesebel". Sorry, but "Jesebel" is just another picture...not a bad one...but one to be savored and remembered. I struggle to give it a "7".One thing I find inappropriate in this film is much of the musical score. Frankly, there are many places where it is simply too modern for a period piece.