Renée's in a Fielding of her own By Mike Davies, The Birmingham Post - April 13, 2001 Helen Fielding's book
- evolved from her newspaper column - wasn't the instant hit popular legend
now believes. Not until its paperback publication - far easier for its target
audience to read on the tube and bus - did Bridget's diarised panic take hold
of a generation of young working women sharing the same neuroses about having
both a career and a life, while living with the paranoia about the size of
their bum. Today, the gender
opposite of Nick Hornby's High Fidelity, it's a monumental international
best-seller and Bridget, a sort of insecure female's Adrian Mole, has become
an icon of the times. So, when it was
announced that Texan Renée Zellweger was going to play the nation's favourite
singleton, there was predictable outrage. A Bridge too far indeed. But while the
accent's slightly plummier than you might have expected, any doubts that she's
miscast last for all of what, five seconds. Plumped up to a respectably
everyday size 12 (far better than the book's weight obsessive, anorexia
suspect 8st), it's impossible to imagine anyone other than Zellweger as the
chainsmoking, vodka/chardonnay glugging sex-starved thirtysomething Bridget,
who despairs of ever joining the 'smug marrieds' given the emotional idiots
that appear to comprise the entire male race. The film, directed in
uninspired but efficient manner by Fielding's mate Sharon Maguire, who was
herself the model for Bridget's best friend Shazza, is pretty much faithful to
the book. Publishing company
assistant Bridget embarks on an affair with her dashingly handsome sexy boss
Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) only to find he's a love rat cad as well as a
charmer and subsequently finds herself drawn to aloof barrister Mark Darcy
(Colin Firth) who her mum has been trying to fix her up with for ages. Inevitably in a too
short hour and a half, there's been cuts, shifts and changes to story and
characters. Sadly, there's far too little of Bridget's mates, Shazza (Sally
Phillips), Tom (James Callis) and Jude (Shirley Henderson) but at least in
tackling her parents' marital troubles, the novel's confusing time share scam
has been ditched in favour of having mum (Gemma Jones) become, not some senior
citizen Rikki Lake, but a shopping channel hostess who runs off with its
perma-tanned, lothario presenter. You'll be glad to
know though that the vicars and tarts scene with Bridget in bunny outfit
remains intact, likewise the fireman's pole. The screenplay was
initially drafted by Fielding and Andrew Davies. However, the film's tone -
and I daresay much of the comic business involving Grant, playing wonderfully
against his loveable posh bumbler image, like a Hugh Grant impersonator doing
a pastiche - is undoubtedly largely the responsibility of Richard Curtis,
writer of Notting Hill and, of course Four Weddings And A Funeral with which
it shares its opening word. Which means that it's both very funny (with great
one liners and some killer visual throwaways, Zellweger's fitness cycle gag
one of the best) and touchingly romantic, but also opens up a cynically tart
vein. A thoroughly
entertaining chick flick date movie that men can enjoy without feeling like
nancies, this is a passport to stardom for Zellweger and an affirmation that
you don't have to look like a twig to have sex appeal. It should safely keep the multiplexes packed well into the summer and, if nothing else, it's going to make big knickers this year's thong.
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