Set a decade after the events of Edge of Reason, we learn there wasn’t a happily ever after for Bridget (Renee Zellweger) and her on-again off-again beau, Mark Darcy (Colin Firth). In an effort to get back on the horse, Bridget has, in close succession, a one-night stand with an Internet millionaire (Patrick Dempsey) and a down-on-the-dumps Darcy.
Advertisement
The fact is, Bridget Jones’s Baby is best summed up in one scene: following the positive result of her pregnancy test, Bridget visits with a doctor (Emma Thompson), and tries to trick her into revealing her date of conception – without revealing that she slept with two different men a week apart. Now 43 years old, she’s at her “perfect weight” (though still trying to lose more, because even ideal is not good enough), and accidentally pregnant after fun nights a week apart with handsome American Jack (Patrick Dempsey), and Mark (Colin Firth), the ex she never got over.
The good news is that “Bridget Jones’s Baby” feels less like trying to cash in on past successes and more like reconnecting with an old friend you haven’t thought about in quite some time. “And so I just kept going”, Zellweger, 47, says. “The way that Bridget manages to persevere-despite circumstances that might bring her down-inspires people”.
Indeed, her life looks pretty good.
“I wanted to do things you can’t really make time for when you’re in the cycle of making films, because if you’re not preparing for one, then you’re preparing for another”.
Bridget Jones’s Baby opens in cinemas across the United Kingdom today and if you decide to watch it, the eagle-eyed among you may realise that some of the hospital scenes were filmed at our cancer centre on Huntley Street.
The Oscar victor sparked speculation that she had had plastic surgery on her face when she attended an Elle event in 2014.
Once again, our Bridget is basically a modern-day Austen heroine, which means two men must battle for her affections. She’s now a seasoned news producer, and at 43, considerably older than he female co-workers. (SoulCycle, Pussy Riot, millennials with amusing facial hair who use Instagram to take pictures of their lunches: No sacred cow goes untouched here!) Sharon Maguire returns as the director, completing a sense that this is as much a reunion of old friends as a movie that had to happen.
“I was scared, but also curious as I wanted to see what had happened to all the characters 11 years on”, said the director.
“I wanted to go back to school”. She walks away from that, too, and life goes on – until she discover that she’s pregnant.
Advertisement
In 1996, Helen Fielding introduced the world to a frumpy, single workingwoman from England in the bestselling novel, Bridget Jones’s Diary.
