DIARY OF ROMANCE
RENEE ZELLWEGER SHINES AS BRIDGET JONES

Rocky Mountain Review - April13, 2001

It doesn't take much insight to understand why Bridget Jones's Diary became such a popular read. Helen Fielding's 1996 novel, which began life as a column in British newspapers, focused on an overweight, 32-year-old London woman who struggled to cut back on food, cigarettes and alcohol. Readers identified.

Fielding's Jones also fretted over finding the right man - sometimes any man at all. She became a heroine for downtrodden working women who struggle with self-image, a chubby goddess of '90s consciousness presented with just enough satirical spin to allow readers to maintain some face-saving distance.

Now comes the movie version, starring Renee Zellweger as Bridget. It took a bit of adjustment for the British press to accept Zellweger in the lead role. Initially, I had a similar problem, but not because of Zellweger's acting or accent. Unlike Gwyneth Paltrow, who frequently works with an English accent, Zellweger seems thoroughly American.

Zellweger pulls off a neat trick, conveying an engaging mixture of cuteness and smarts in a woman who always seems to be one step away from total happiness or crushing despair. To play the role, Zellweger not only mastered a British accent but gained 20 pounds. She's entirely plausible as a woman who displays something every actress battles against: fat.

In an opening scene, Bridget sits alone in her apartment, drinking wine and lip-syncing All by Myself. In that moment of loneliness, Zellweger re-establishes her reputation as a deft comic actress, redeeming herself from work in dubious efforts such as Me Myself and Irene and Nurse Betty. Zellweger carries Bridget to paydirt.

Director Sharon Maguire (working from a screenplay by Fielding and two additional writers) has softened the novel to concoct something more palatable for movies; a romantic comedy that skims wittily along its attractive surface.

Zellweger receives support from Hugh Grant and Colin Firth, who play the men in her life. Grant portrays Daniel, Bridget's boss in the world of London publishing, where she works in public relations. He's charming and slick. When he falls for Bridget, we brace for trouble.

Grant's Daniel contrasts with Mark Darcy (Firth's character), a smug attorney with remarkably bad taste in sweaters. He's wearing a sweater emblazoned with a large reindeer's head when we meet him at a New Year's party. Bridget's mom (Gemma Jones) drags her to the party in hopes of introducing her to a suitable man.

The dialogue brims with glib assertion. Get one area of life under control and another surely will unravel - at least for Bridget. Just as she seems to be getting on famously with Daniel, her mother falls for a TV pitchman, leaving her poor father (Jim Broadbent) to suffer in solitude.

Buoyed by her newfound, albeit untested, romance, Bridget mistakenly asks Daniel if he loves her. Thus begins Daniel's commitment anxiety, which leads to a variety of developments that make Mark look more attractive.

Once Bridget gets crosswise with Daniel, she seeks new work, landing a job in current-affairs television where she does vacuous features. A spot involving a fire house and fire pole results in a pretty good laugh. A scene in which Bridget wears a costume to a party without having been told that the costume part of the event had been canceled should resonate with anyone who ever has felt acutely out of place at a social gathering.

Maguire's direction isn't always supple. A fight between Grant and Firth seems to be carried a bit far, leading to some broad physical humor that's a bit out of place. And the ending seems protracted and pat.

But Grant finally gets to play a man whose attractive surface conceals shoddy character traits. Firth, familiar from the BBC adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, makes the transition from pompous to appealing. Bridget Jones, sort of Austen for the moment, has a pleasing blend of romance and laughs. The trendy novel that inspired the movie may slip from view, but Zellweger's Bridget should linger fondly in memory.