'Goodbye June' review: Winslet's directorial debut falls short of potential
Published in Entertainment News
It isn’t that myriad aspects of the story told in the family drama “Goodbye June” won’t prove relatable to many who watch it. They will.
It isn’t that the film — debuting on Netflix this week after a limited theatrical release — isn’t chock full of solid performances from talented actors. It is.
It’s that the work of Kate Winslet and Joe Anders — a first-time director and screenwriter, respectively, and mother and son — rises only to the level of “fine.”
“Fine” is good enough but nonetheless disappointing given that this Christmastime-set affair centers around an English family dealing with the impending death of its beloved matriarch. It’s the kind of story that should violently stir your emotions.
Oh, sure, there’s a reasonably gentle swirling here and there — including, importantly, in the movie’s final stretch, which is its strongest — but the guess is you won’t go through a whole box of tissues as you, too, bid farewell to June.
The titular character is portrayed by Helen Mirren (“The Queen,” “MobLand”), who, unsurprisingly given her immense talent, turns in the strongest work in the film as a woman at the end of a battle with cancer. You’ll find no vanity in her portrayal of June, who deals with bouts of immense pain and exhaustion — not just from the invasive disease but also from her bickering adult children. (According to the film’s production notes, the acclaimed performer broke a personal rule, to never play someone who was dying, after being asked by Winslet to read the script.)
Winslet (“Lee,” “Mare of Easttown”) is quite good in front of the camera as one of June’s children, second-oldest daughter Julia. Julia is juggling a successful career and three kids as her husband works a job very far away.
And Julia clashes constantly with her younger sister, Molly (Andrea Riseborough, “To Leslie”), who has kids of her own and a husband (Stephen Merchant, “Extras”) whom she can’t even count on to bring home the sheep’s milk yogurt for which she asked in no uncertain terms.
June’s oldest daughter, Helen (Toni Collette, “Hereditary”), is a woo-woo type — yoga, crystals, etc. — living elsewhere in the country. En route back home, she listens to a self-help tape. “Try and see your family not as anger or a disturbance to your energy but as a separate energy altogether,” it instructs. “Stay in neutral. Breathe into your heart space.”
And then there’s Connor (Johnny Flynn), the lone son of June and her husband, Bernie (an over-the-top Timothy Spall, “Death Valley”), who lives with his parents and is the sweetest soul of the offspring. Connor is the can’t-we-all-just-get-along type, and in the hands of Flynn (“Emma”), it all feels quite sincere.
Soon, the whole bunch is at the hospital, Julia and Molly immediately butting heads over what is best for Mum. A rotation is even drawn up so they don’t visit at the same time.
Adding to the, um, fun is Bernie, who seems at least semi-oblivious to the situation, behaving obnoxiously in June’s hospital room and regularly slipping away to a pub — behavior that eventually draws the ire of Connor.
Thankfully, the latter makes a connection with an extremely kind nurse on the floor, Angel (Fisayo Akinade, “Cucumber”), who serves as a calming presence for the family as a whole. (Akinade spent “several days” shadowing doctors and nurses in preparation for the role and gives a performance perhaps second only to that of Mirren.)
According to the production notes, Anders began working on the screenplay at 19, for a class at England’s National Film and Television School, drawing inspiration from the passing of his own grandmother, during which “all the family were around her and together in sending her off in a peaceful way.” Winslet encouraged him to keep working on it, eventually deciding not just to produce and act in it but also direct.
It feels fair to chalk up their combined inexperience for “Goodbye June” doing more telling than showing, especially evident in a lengthy cathartic scene in a hospital corridor featuring Julia and Molly. Although nicely acted by Winslet and Riseborough, it’s a microcosm of the film: It crosses its Ts and dots its Is but falls short of giving you the feels.
Again, those do come — to a degree — in the extended family’s final moments with June, followed by a welcome epilogue set a year later.
There’s enough here — scenes such as the one in which June asks Julia to apply some makeup to her, Mirren deftly delivering the line, “I’ve never died before; I want to look nice when it happens” — that “Goodbye June” is worth recommending.
Still, you can’t help but suspect the screenplay may have benefited from a pass by a more experienced writer and that a seasoned filmmaker could have drawn more from it.
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‘GOODBYE JUNE’
2.5 stars (out of 4)
MPA rating: R (for language)
Running time: 1:54
How to watch: Netflix
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©2025 The News-Herald (Willoughby, Ohio). Visit The News-Herald (Willoughby, Ohio) at www.news-herald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.












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