“Bridget Jones has cocked things up for the very last time,” the eponymous character (Renée Zellweger, Case 39) advised viewers at the end of Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason; however that definitive parting statement proved to be anything but. It might’ve taken 12 years, but the bumbling British singleton is back for another cinematic romantic comedy exploring her ever-chaotic love life. Viewers familiar with the preceding 2004 effort, or the 2001 page-to-screen adaptation that started it all, can guess where Bridget Jones’s Baby is headed.
While the titular figure is older, and — as she quickly references — skinnier, little else has changed this time around. That extends to the off-screen efforts of original director Sharon Maguire, series author Helen Fielding, and new franchise writers Dan Mazer (I Give It A Year) and Emma Thompson (Effie Gray), with every decision designed to deliver the same light and fluffy wish-fulfilment-fuelled antics that made the initial duo such hits. All the foreseeable beats are struck as a result, in a film that feels crafted by committee and approved by a focus group of cheering forty-something women. Thankfully, affection reigns supreme; Bridget Jones’s Baby may be predictable, almost cheesily so, but it’s never anything less than warm and adoring.
Despite her previous promise, Bridget starts the film much like all of the others: unattached and unhappy about it, with Mark Darcy (Colin Firth, Kingsman: The Secret Service) still a lingering presence, and another guy providing a potential dating prospect. The latter comes not in the form of Hugh Grant’s absent lothario, but in the guise of a fleeting dalliance with billionaire mathematician turned online dating entrepreneur, Jack (Patrick Dempsey, TV’s Grey’s Anatomy). Though encouraged by her work colleague Miranda (Sarah Solemani, The Five) to embrace being footloose and fancy-free at 43, an unexpected pregnancy complicates matters. Instead, Bridget finds herself preparing to become a mother and caught between the two men that might be the father.
With the stretched The Edge of Reason a marked step down from the affable Bridget Jones’s Diary, Bridget Jones’s Baby could only prove an improvement. That’s faint praise for a comedic sequel that is clearly more interested in evoking comfort than being innovative, as its playlist-friendly soundtrack repeatedly demonstrates. Here, tone is everything; it’s the fondness that springs as the feature recreates famous scenes with a 2016 twist, and recreates much of the first two movies’ narrative ups and downs as well, that’s intermittently entertaining, rather than the underlying details. Indeed, Bridget Jones’s Baby is a film caught between its careful eye for the minutiae of a fictional character audiences have followed since she first popped up in a newspaper column more than twenty years ago, and throwing her into a familiar-enough scenario painted with the broadest of strokes.
Accordingly, it’s Zellweger’s efforts that help patch over the film’s general by-the-numbers approach, as ably assisted by Firth looking perfectly nonplussed and Thompson adding some wry humour as Bridget’s obstetrician. As the storyline careens through silly situations such as a model-filled funeral, glamping at a festival and combating workplace hipsters, Zellweger remains spirited and earnest, and ensures Bridget retains her amiable everywoman-like status. That said, the movie’s atmosphere of devotion spills over to those watching, as well. Anyone who isn’t already a Bridget fan isn’t likely to see the appeal; those that are will get exactly what they expect.
Rating: 2 ½ stars out of 5
Bridget Jones’s Baby
Director: Sharon Maguire
Ireland | UK | France | USA, 2016, 122 mins
Release date: September 15
Distributor: Universal
Rated: M
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