Bridget Jones's Diary: 6/10

Rating: 6/10 (31 January 2004)

If there's anything I hate more than overrated movies, it's overhyped movies that don't even begin to live up to their reputation. Bridget Jones's Diary is one of the latter. With an original premise (which is of course taken from a book), a rising star, and charm out the wazoo, how could you go wrong? It's all in the marketing. A clever comedy has to have two things. A consistent clever quality to it and comedy. When lacking in either of these two categories, the company (usually Miramax) just overhypes it (as they're great at doing) so it'll be like the next Gone with the Wind or something and make sure that everyone knows that the lead actress packed on a couple extra pounds. And, unfortunately, that's what this movie is.
The title character (Renée Zellweger) is a slightly overweight, slight neurotic thirtysomething who has a menial job and wants to make something out of her life. So she starts a diary and becomes romanticly involved with her boss. Without the diary, the movie would just be another British chick flick. The diary adds some characteristic to the movie, but, as most movies do, anything interesting they could do with the material is defenestrated for general romantic comed clichés and stereotyped characters.
Why am I being so harsh on it, you may ask? Well, I had been hearing the hype for two years, since the movie first came out. "Oh, Renée is so good, she gained 25 pounds!" "The movie is hilarious!" Oftentimes I can just put away the hype and go in with an open mind. But I did not see this before hearing about it; if I had, I'm sure I would have enjoyed it more. For example, I saw My Big Fat Greek Wedding before it was huge and grossed over $200 million at the box office. I enjoyed it a lot, but if I watched it for the first time now, I'm sure I'd be thinking exactly what I am about this movie here. I was led to believe that this movie was strikingly original, nothing else had been done before that was even remotely close to it. As I have mentioned earlier, the only original part of it was the fact that the diary was getting us closer to Bridget's life. But after the first twenty minutes or so, when they knew they had us in, they took it out and went to cliché land.
There were some funny moments to it, though. Nothing was down-and-out hilarious, but many points were pretty humorous, although I wouldn't be able to name them now. It's not one of those movies that sticks with you, it's just one of those that you can use to pass the time and that can be used by production companies for unnecessary sequels.
Renée (who starred in here before she became America's it-girl) was pretty good and mastered a British accent masterfully, and proves that she's worthy of a future in romantic comedy. Hugh Grant, as Bridget's boss, is his usual self, and Colin Firth, as Bridget's other love interest, is alright, but that added a few plot holes, such as: if Bridget could never get a guy all of her life, how come suddenly she gets two at the same time, not to mention they look like Hugh Grant and Colin Firth? I guess I'm overreacting, but when I see something that's not what it's cracked up to me, I get upset, which is how Bridget Jones's Diary made me feel.
My rating: 6/10
Rated R for language and some strong sexuality.