Our dear Bridget is the amalgamation of every woman's nightmare and bad hair day rolled up into one over analytical mess. She says exactly what she wants, when she wants and in the most embarrassingly absurd manner, she graphically embodies every woman's idiosyncrasies standing open mouthed in front of the mirror, during mascara application. Bridget's funny, she's witty, she has a wonderfully strong mind - as long as it's kept well out of earshot - but can she get a man?

Can she hell!

"V-Bad!"

Bridget Jones...one of our nations most prized possessions first hit the headlines in Helen Fielding's column for the Independent. Fielding however based the now infamous character on another strong minded, opinionated young woman who's chasing her Mr Darcy - none other than Jane Austen's Elizabeth Bennet.


"Jane Austen's plots are very good and have been market researched over a number of centuries," Fielding tells us, "so I decided simply to steal one of them. I thought she wouldn't mind and anyway she's dead."


Helen Fielding has taken all the important elements from the classic novel and given then 90's twists, Bridget Jones is the Elizabeth for the 1990's, but her personality has been toned down. Bridget has the ability to speak out and argue for what she believes in, but doesn't because she doesn't have the confidence, this is as freedom in today's society is a burden in some respects. She has to live up to certain ideals of the modern woman despite her equality (this is shown through her obsession with her weight). Lizzy, although shackled by political correctness is less inhibited, and cares less about her outward perception, if Mr Darcy is to love her; he has to love her for who she is already.

Bridget is you're typical thirty something woman with a mother you could happily strangle, but life goes from bad to worse when she finally gets her man - Daniel Cleaver. She has considered him her ideal man since she saw him...and when he isn't cheating and isn't being a jerk, he's still not the one. The one is her very own Mr Darcy, Mark Darcy. Not that things go smoothly. Motherly embarrassment and her trust in Daniel plus the added bonus of her being "bizarre" and humiliated by Mark at first acquaintance prevent any spark of romance. But in true Mr Darcy style, Mark comes to her rescue and she realises she actually quite likes him. V.G.

Following the success of Bridget Jones's Diary in 1997, two years later we yet again lurch back to another drunken fumbled attempt by Bridget to get her man. The "wilderness years" are far from over and we get all the gossip in the sequel Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. When we reunite with the happy couple all is well and we are assured Bridget is very much in love...but when you have "a boyfriend-stealing ex-friend with thighs like a baby giraffe" on the prowl, an 8ft hole in your living room wall, a mother obsessed with exotic holidays and African tribesmen, bullet toting builders, jail, unemployment, lithe oriental boys and of course you're Bridget, "all you need is love," is certainly not all you need! And when one best friend has deserted you (Tom), one is getting married and renouncing her singleton life (Jude) and the other is a feminist with a crush (Shaz), no matter how much Bridge tries to perk up, it is doomed from the beginning. When Bridget loses Mark to the jellyfish she's obviously distraught and it wouldn't matter how much Mark tried and she loved him, shagging Rebecca is not the best method to get her back.

V.B.

In Summer 2001 Bridget Jones's Diary hit our screens with a star-studded cast:

Renée Zellweger
(Me, Myself and Irene, Jerry Maguire, Nurse Betty and Empire Records)
- a Texan - despite many doubts took up the part of our English Rose.

Colin Firth
(Fever Pitch, Shakespeare in Love, Pride and Prejudice and The Importance of Being Ernest)
took the role of Mr Darcy for the second time (and was specifically chosen, as Mark Darcy was based around his performance as Mr Darcy in the BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice)

Hugh Grant
(Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill, About a Boy and Sirens)
And the nervous geeky mess - Hugh Grant - in Notting Hill and Four Weddings and Funeral rendered the part of Daniel Cleaver slimier that imaginable.

With Supporting Cast including:

Jim Broadbent..............as Colin Jones

James Callis................as Tom

Shirley Henderson.......as Jude

Gemma Jones.............as Pam Jones

Sally Philips..................as Sharon (Shaz)


V.V.G.

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that the moment one area of your life starts going okay, another will turn into a total disaster."


And this is Bridget's life's problem, as soon as she thinks she's got her life in order or has a decent relationship she mucks up; even her hairdryer has it in for her and doesn't want her and Mark's first date to happen...but despite the neurotic quality of calorie counting, fat units, alcohol units and cigarette she has a fantastically open and intelligent personality which is screaming out to be loved. The problem is all the quick and witty comments are locked tightly by the straightjacket of English correctness and so she appears to get more and more irrational the closer she gets to "the devastating hunk she's been waiting for her whole life to meet."

"Complete with English accent and an extra 20 pounds on her tiny frame, a slightly chunky Ms. Zellweger is about as disarmingly charming as anyone could be. As the desperate singleton Bridget Jones klutzy, dressed in dowdy Marks and Spencer duds, a fashionista's nightmare she nevertheless manages to win, convincingly, the hearts of two breathtakingly attractive men."

"Do you remember Mark Darcy, darling? Malcolm and Elaine's son? He's one of these super-dooper top-notch lawyers. Divorced. Elaine says he works all the time and he's terribly. I think he might be coming to Una's New Year's Day Turkey Curry Buffet, actually."


The last thing anyone wants is to be set up yet again with a boring old divorcee who's terribly lonely, but it's despite having terrible taste in Christmas jumpers and a disastrous introduction Mark Darcy isn't what he seems. Maybe what Bridget needs to do is listen to her heart about him and not her head.

"The stand-offish Mark Darcy - devastatingly handsome, successful, and the one person who's always around just as Bridget makes another blunder."

"Colin Firth, as the brooding good guy, seems to epitomise heroism and, shucks, all that is eternally good about humanity in a way that he hasn't since...well, the last time he played the brooding good guy."

Daniel Cleaver is the metaphorical thorn in Bridget's side, life and relationships. If the huge crush she had on him prior to their momentary fling (around 2 months) wasn't enough, his previous history with Mark Darcy and lying nature certainly was. When he discovers that Bridget knows the "bloody old woman" the lies seem to roll off the tongue and he turns Bridge against her Darcy with great ease. But lies have a tendency to bite back and after his cheating with Suki (a.k.a. Lara in the film) and the discovery of his and Mark's secret history Bridget is quick to see him for what he really is. Daniel seems to want everything Mark has even is he doesn't really want it...

...including Bridget

"Hugh Grant, is a cad and a bounder, achieves a level of devilish appeal, irresistible anyway, but all the more so for being shockingly unexpected." Hugh Grant goes from geek to chic with the right quantity of slime.

Shaz, Jude and Tom, Bridget's strange friends, give her (not always useful) advice on her love life, but always stick close to their friend. Shaz (Sally Philips) is an angry feminist who likes to say F**K a lot, Tom (James Callis) the original gay Pop Idol who’s only really objective is to get Bridget into bed with a member of the opposite sex and Jude (Shirley Henderson) the sheepish yet brilliantly strong business executive. Bridget would be nowhere without her friends, but sometimes nowhere looks fairly appealing.

Pam (Gemma Jones), Bridget's mum who's antics lead to no end of trouble for Bridget and everyone else, but she is the main reason Mark and Bridge get anywhere...shame it was the prospect of jail that did it. "Was obviously completely put off by culinary disaster and criminal element in family."

Colin, Bridget's dad whose constant dilemma isn't Bridge's disastrous love life, but the antics of her uncontrollable mother, Pam. Adorably portrayed by Jim Broadbent you can see the remarkably happy interior of this character who is constantly being out shone by his wife's frightening dress sense.

Over the past few months Helen Fielding, Richard Curtis and Andrew Davies have been working on the script for the sequel Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. Problems have arisen as Renée Zellweger wishes not to put on the extra weight Bridget is so concerned about (in my childish opinion I think Renee looked ten times more attractive when she was "Bridget Size" as apposed to "Renee Size"...and I'm not alone, Colin Firth and Hugh Grant have both supposedly commented in a similar manner!) and the presence in Fielding novel of an interview with actor Colin firth by - the drooling - Bridget press's the question: do we or don't we leave this out? ("I wrote the part of Mark Darcy for Colin Firth and I do hope he will come back for a repeat of his lovely performance," Fielding told Daily Variety. "If he does, he will simply have to don a large beard and handlebar moustache and play himself.")

The lack of Hugh Grants character Cleaver in the second novel begs the question: do we want to exclude him?

In my opinion although the first film missed out vital motherly embarrassment and rescues by the dashing Darcy in a romantic comedy of 1 hour 30 minutes it would be impossible to prevent such important scenes reaching the cutting room floor.

Happily Ever After?
Not quite, Bridget wouldn't be Bridget without a huge number of complete cock ups, a glass of Chardonnay and a cigarette...

but hey, she'll hopefully - if rumours prove to be true - be back for a re-run at some point in the New Year...

...V.V.G