We went to see the return of Renee Zellweger in her 3rd outing as RomCom favourite, Bridget Jones.
In previous films, we’ve learnt about Bridget Jones’s Diary and then we saw Bridget question if she was ready to be in a relationship in Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, well for the next stage in her life, we have this new film, Bridget Jones’s Baby.
Set 12 years later, we start the film with Bridget still working at the same TV news studio with Richard (Neil Pearson) but the big news is she has sadly broken up with Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) who has since remarried, which we learn at the funeral of Daniel Cleaver!
Bridget again finds she’s a singleton once more, this time, she appears to be more positive about it!
Her life, however, is completely different, in particular, her relationships with all her friends, we do see Tom (James Callis) Shazzer (Sally Philllips) and Jude (Shirley Henderson) again, but they are all now busy with married life and children.
Bridget now has a new younger best friend in TV news anchor, Miranda (Sarah Solemani) and has decided to join her at a pop festival.
At the festival, after being rescued from falling in mud, she has a chance meeting with Jack (Patrick Dempsey), they meet again later, after Bridget has had far too many to drink, well one thing leads to another, but when she wakes up alone, she assumes it was a one night stand and heads back to her single life.
A couple of weeks later, at a friends christening, she has another night of rekindled passion with Darcy, who is now getting a divorce. The result of these 2 encounters is Bridget is pregnant and had no idea who the father is.
We get some laughs as Bridget learns that Jack is actually a very rich man, having created a dating algorithm website, and how she uses her TV show to get his DNA to carry out a paternity test.
The 2 potential fathers then try to get along, whilst at same time trying to upstage the other for Bridget’s affections, yet it never reaches the highs of Darcy’s challenges with Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) from the previous 2 outings. Sadly no silly fight sequence in this film other than a squabble to get in revolving doors!
The trouble with this film being that you want Bridget to end up with Darcy, due to their chemistry from the previous 2 outings and Dempsey’s Jack, whilst good, you don’t have the same dislike of him that we did of Cleaver, who never really loved Bridget, but played the loveable scoundrel so well.
For me, this is the films biggest issue as I therefore never really wanting Bridget to end up with Jack. Yet, you also do have doubts about her ending up with Darcy, when we learn the reasons why they broke up! Does Bridget actually need a man?
What decision will Bridget make, the film-makers filmed 3 endings so you will need to see the film to find out
I personally felt that following the 3rd book of the creator of Bridget, Helen Fielding, Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy, may have made a better film.
The book made the brave decision to have Darcy die at the start of the book, this in part means you would have given any other character a chance to win the heart of Bridget!
The film is an enjoyable Sunday afternoon watch, but we found it the weakest of the trilogy, this also being in part to it being the longest of the 3 films.
There are definitely lots to like about it, Zellweger and Firth slip back into their characters with ease; Dempsey has a lot of fun in his role; Emma Thompson, who also assisted on the film script, is great as Bridget’s Doctor, during the pregnancy. We must also mention the great but underused Jim Broadbent and Gemma Jones returning as Bridget’s mum and dad.
This film has been a big British box office hit, and many of my friends have seen it and loved it, but for me, I sadly would only go as far as to say I liked it, how about you? Did you enjoy the film, would you like to see another outing for Bridget? We’d love to hear from you!
Bridget Jones Baby is directed by Sharon Maguire
And written by Helen Fielding; Dan Mazer and Emma Thompson
Rated 15 and had a run time of 2 hours and 3 minutes
You can watch the trailer at the films website here:
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