Renée
Zellweger’s appealing performance anchors this otherwise standard romcom
Allison Shoemaker |
Consequence of Sound – September
15, 2016
To paraphrase Jane Austen, it
is a truth universally acknowledged that a romantic comedy in want of
a sequel will find some reason to split up the couple around which it’s
centered. Is it contrived? Yes. Do jokes fall flat? Sure. Can the ending
be guessed from moment one? Of course. The most surprising thing about Bridget
Jones’s Baby has nothing to do with the perennial singleton’s
offspring or the tropes of romantic comedies. What’s surprising is that, despite all
the contrivances and stale conventions, this movie’s not half bad, and
occasionally better than that.
There’s a pretty simple reason. The return of Bridget Jones, 15 years
after she first appeared on screen, means the return of Renée
Zellweger, hallelujah. There’s been a lot of unnecessary press about her in
recent weeks, and it will be a total shame if it drowns out what really
matters about having this actor back on-screen. In her heyday, Zellweger
was a somewhat divisive figure, a love-her-or-hate-her kind of performer
(this writer falls on the former side). Despite this, her onscreen
vulnerability, natural charm, and undeniable skills racked up awards and
nominations left and right – including an Oscar nomination for Bridget
Jones’s Diary, the first film in the trilogy that Baby will
ostensibly conclude.
She got that nomination for a reason. While this performance almost
certainly won’t generate that kind of buzz, Zellweger is once again
excellent, with that aforementioned vulnerability present in full force.
With the help of director Sharon Maguire (returning from the
first film), the Oscar winner brings back all of Bridget’s quirks and
fumbles while lending her a wry, grown-up, and slightly tired air that
adds layers to a film that probably doesn’t really need or deserve them.
It’s a paint-by-numbers affair: Bridget starts this film as she did the
first, listening to Celine Dion’s “All By Myself” with a forlorn
look on her face. Despite getting the guy (Mark Darcy, played by the
always-welcome Colin Firth) at the end of the first movie, as well as
at the end of the sour cash-grab that was Bridget Jones: the Edge
of Reason (2004), Jones is alone again, much to absolutely no
one’s surprise. However, she makes a change straightaway, trading Celine
for House of Pain (a winning opening that earns quite a lot of goodwill)
and opting to forget all those old goals in favor of a life spent doing
whatever (and whoever) she wants. Before you can say “it’s in the
title,” Bridget’s pregnant, and she’s not sure which handsome rich
guy (Firth and Patrick Dempsey, equal parts winning and whiny) is the
father.
It all plays out from there pretty much as one would expect, with a few
exceptions. First, it’s impossible not to be a little surprised when
Zellweger’s in top form, as she is here. At times you expect a
punchline, and instead get pathos; the reverse is true just as often.
She’s not alone in elevating the material. Firth continues to play all
manner of Misters Darcy like no one else can, Sarah Solemani acts
as a winning foil to Bridget as her friend/coworker Miranda, and Emma
Thompson steals pretty much every scene she’s in as Bridget’s
obstetrician. Thompson’s also on hand for nearly all the film’s most
affecting moments as well, and her scenes one-on-one with Zellweger hint
at how interesting a story about Bridget Jones, her baby, and no father at
all could be.
That’s a sense the film carries as a whole. At times, the screenplay (by Bridget
Jones’s Diary novelist Helen Fielding, Dan Mazer, and Thompson
herself) seems to drag its feet about finally getting back to the love
triangle around which it’s centered. It’s at its best and most
energetic when Bridget deals with how the pregnancy might render her
obsolete to the millenials in management at her office, when she confronts
the realities of having a person baking inside of her, when she’s
letting her father in on what’s going on (Jim Broadbent, reliably
wonderful), or when her many quirks finally wind up biting her in the ass
in the rain. Bridget Jones’s Baby delivers on the
smooshy stuff, to be sure – the screening attended for this review was
filled with cheers, audible gasps, and awws at the required beats – but
it’s the stuff in between that really delivers.
Perhaps that’s not a surprise, after all. Often one sees films like Bridget
Jones’s Baby because it offers a chance to get empathetically
wrapped up in someone else’s story for a bit, to feel the heartbreak and
warmth and nervousness and fear and joy and bewilderment that accompany
the process of falling in love. But the mechanics of a romantic comedy
don’t make it great. It’s up to the characters – and thus the
performers, writers, and directors – to turn something flat into
something lovely. Bridget Jones’s Baby probably won’t
make any year-end lists, nor should it. But in a few years, when it shows
up on TBS, plenty of people will stop changing the channel and fall back
in love for a bit. Bridget Jones is an odd but ordinary woman, and this is
an odd but ordinary film. That doesn’t make her (or it) any less
lovable, just as they are.
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