Review: Just swing away, Renee

Geoff Carter

Wednesday, April 11, 2001 | 2:12 a.m.

Bridget Jones's Diary

Grade: Two and a half stars

Starring: Renee Zellweger, Colin Firth and Hugh Grant

Screenplay: Richard Curtis, Andrew Davies and Helen Fielding.

Director: Sharon Maguire.

Rated: R for language and some strong sexuality.

Running time: 94 minutes.

There are many, many funny lines of dialogue in "Bridget Jones's Diary" -- not a one of them I can quote in a family-oriented publication. I laughed often, usually despite myself and silently rooted for the principals even though I knew where the narrative would place each and every one by the last reel.

That's all right. We expect our love stories to follow the same kind of roller-coaster track. Sure, the dips and turns may differ, but we always know that it is a roller coaster -- and no matter how much we scream or exult, no matter if we throw our hands in the air or cover our face with them, we will return to the station with a better appreciation of our lives.

Now, I haven't read the Helen Fielding bestseller on which "Bridget Jones's Diary" is based and I have no plans to do so. I don't want to bring Renee Zellweger's performance to Fielding's words, because I might find something in them that convinces me that she wasn't the right person for the job. Even without literary backup, Zellweger's Bridget seemed touch-and-go at first, and her British accent threatened to veer off the left side of the road -- but once she began lip-synching "All By Myself," kicking and pouting like a Rockette, I would have followed her anywhere -- even into oncoming traffic.

Zellweger owns "Bridget." No other actor comes within a country mile of her. She has a delightfully cartoonish smile, an addictive personality and a slightly wobbly manner that suggests there's a smaller Renee inside the real one, skillfully working the Giant Movie Star controls. Her Bridget is sexy, unflappable, tender and human in ways that no other actress could have approximated. Every second she's on screen -- nearly all of them -- is a delight.

And even though she doesn't need it, she has help from first-time director Sharon Maguire -- to the film's detriment. Maguire's awkward, TV-like staging pulls away from the film's two other strongest performances: Hugh Grant as Bridget's sleazy boyfriend and boss Daniel Cleaver and Colin Firth as stuffy lawyer Mark Darcy. Both men turn in honest, fully-developed performances; Maguire undercuts them by surrounding them with hammy mugging by the supporting cast.

Grant, in particular, nails his best performance in a long while. He seems at home in the body of a disingenuous, two-timing lover, which I'd chalk up to years of repression from being made to play so many hapless, stuttering yahoos; unfortunately, "Bridget's" script reduces him to that level at one point, and you lose interest in him. By way of comparison, Firth's Darcy plays stoic for so much of the picture that when he finally loosens up, you can't quite buy it. Surely Renee has stronger options than these?

Well, no. "Bridget" uses the old trick of surrounding the heroine with weak, shrill and/or impolite women. It's the love story equivalent of a corkscrew loop, which is fun the first time out, annoying on the fifth go-round. Question: Why couldn't Bridget just punch these verbally abusive women out, stomp on their toes or spit in their champagne? Is it some kind of British thing?

In any case, "Bridget Jones's Diary" is a fun, fleet comedy -- perhaps a bit profane, but such is the nature of diaries: As Bridget tells a suitor, "Diaries are mostly full of (expletive)." Such is Zellweger's power that she can fling most of that dubious stuff at the screen and make it stick.