Bridget Jones – Schokolade zum Frühstück (2001)

Bridget Jones – Schokolade zum Frühstück: Directed by Sharon Maguire. With Renée Zellweger, Gemma Jones, Celia Imrie, James Faulkner. Bridget Jones is determined to improve herself while she looks for love in a year in which she keeps a personal diary.

“With certain bad movies – u0026quot;Plan 9 from Outer Spaceu0026quot; is a famous extreme example – you start to wonder if thereu0026#39;s something wrong with people who donu0026#39;t realise that theyu0026#39;re bad. Iu0026#39;m not saying that if someone LIKES u0026quot;Plan 9u0026quot; then his or her brain probably needs to be repaired; the suspicious, unhealthy thing is not LIKING the film, but being of the opinion that itu0026#39;s good. (Many people have a soft spot for it precisely BECAUSE they realise how bad it is. In this way it differs from something like u0026quot;Timecodeu0026quot;, where either liking the film OR having a high opinion of it is something to be embarrassed about.) And something similar applies to, say, u0026quot;Citizen Kaneu0026quot;. Disliking it makes sense; thinking itu0026#39;s a bad film does not.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eBut thereu0026#39;s another kind of film that tempts me to be even more presumptuous. u0026quot;Dumbou0026quot; is the best example I can think of at the moment. I can see why one might (mistakenly) have a low opinion of u0026quot;Dumbou0026quot;: some of the footage IS mere padding, the triumph at the end is too swift, the charge has been laid (falsely, but not ludicrously) that the crows are racist caricatures … and so forth. But surely even the people who think u0026quot;Dumbou0026quot; is a bad film must still manage to like it. If they donu0026#39;t, THEN Iu0026#39;m suspicious.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI feel this way, to a greater or lesser degree, about a number of light comedies, and this is one of them. I canu0026#39;t honestly say that I revere or adore u0026quot;Bridget Jonesu0026#39;s Diaryu0026quot; (N.B.: Iu0026#39;m male), but all the same, I canu0026#39;t help thinking that people who take an active dislike to it have something wrong with them. This applies not just to the film as a whole but to Bridget Jones, the central character, in particular. What has she done to merit dislike? Sheu0026#39;s beautiful (as beautiful as Renée Zellweger has ever been on screen), honest and kind-hearted. The diary she keeps certainly reveals her many flaws, but none is particularly pronounced, most are purely negative and anyway, she shares them all with the rest of us – so donu0026#39;t pretend youu0026#39;re not like this, too.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThis is an amiable, well-written and fresh romantic comedy with, for ONCE, an attractive female protagonist. Itu0026#39;s far from being the greatest film ever made and there may be grounds for attacking it which I havenu0026#39;t touched upon (I suppose there always are), and so all in all Iu0026#39;ll understand your not thinking as much of it as I do, but, dammit, youu0026#39;d better LIKE it.”