Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy (dir. Michael Morris)
Certificate: 15
Running Time: 125 mins
UK Distributor: Universal Pictures
UK Release Date: 13 February 2025
WHO’S IN BRIDGET JONES: MAD ABOUT THE BOY?
Renée Zellweger, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Leo Woodall, Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Colin Firth, Jim Broadbent, Gemma Jones, Isla Fisher, Josette Simon, Nico Parker, Leila Farzad, Sarah Solemani, Sally Phillips, Shirley Henderson, James Callis, Celia Imrie, Ian Midlane, Casper Knopf, Mila Jankovic
WHO’S BEHIND THE CAMERA?
Michael Morris (director), Helen Fielding, Dan Mazer and Abi Morgan (writers), Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner and Jo Wallett (producers), Dustin O’Halloran (composer), Suzie Lavelle (cinematographer), Mark Day (editor)
WHAT’S IT ABOUT?
Bridget Jones (Zellweger) embarks on the next chapter of her ever-rocky love life…
WHAT ARE MY THOUGHTS ON BRIDGET JONES: MAD ABOUT THE BOY?
By most counts, a fourth Bridget Jones movie shouldn’t work. After all, things wrapped up pretty well in the third film, which – spoilers for a nearly 10-year-old movie – ended with Renée Zellweger’s Bridget not only hitched to the love of her life, Colin Firth’s Mark Darcy, but also as a new mother to his son. What more story could there be to tell that wouldn’t utterly destroy the perfect ending for this character? Plus, the nostalgia for the original Bridget Jones’s Diary film from 2001, nor even the Helen Fielding books that inspired it and other films in the franchise, is present but not as strong as other movie series that have been constantly revived with legacy sequels (or “legacy-quels”, as I tend to call them and am surprised hasn’t caught on with others).
But like the titular hopeless romantic herself, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy always finds ways of surprising even the most pessimistic audience member. As it turns out, there’s still plenty to do and say with this character, in a story that’s by far the most mature and heartfelt entry of the lot, and somehow doesn’t entirely step all over what came before.
Except, perhaps, in one major way: Firth’s Darcy is now dead and gone. Arguably the most shocking and somewhat controversial aspect of Fielding’s book of the same name, the fact that the true love of Zellweger’s Bridget was killed whilst in the Sudan is very much kept intact for director Michael Morris’s adaptation, but here it’s no cheap ploy to up the ante. In fact, it serves as the catalyst for the now-widowed Bridget’s new situation: she’s a single mother to son Billy (Casper Knopf) and younger daughter Mabel (Mila Jankovic), hurriedly getting them to school before pragmatic science teacher Mr. Wallaker (Chiwetel Ejiofor) can blow his deafening whistle, and is contemplating getting back to work as a TV producer, as well as back onto the dating scene, four years after Darcy’s death. Soon, she’s swept off her feet by Roxster (Leo Woodall), a much younger man; has a few meaningful flirtations with Wallaker; and even her caddish old flame Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) is back in her life, albeit more as a go-to babysitter than as a genuine potential match. But all the while, Bridget must figure out how she can help herself and her children to move on from their loss, and to start living again without clinging too hard to the past.
Unlike previous entries, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy is less concerned with delivering the usual raunchy slapstick, and more with showing this character at a uniquely dramatic time in her life. Of course, the film does have a few moments of out-there comedy, including a disastrous encounter with lip-filler and the occasional pratfall, but it’s a lot more reserved than before, as Bridget spends much of the movie attempting to navigate around the cold, hard fact that life is slowly creeping up on her and those closest to her. The script – once again co-written by Fielding herself – often highlights this but wisely never turns it into the butt of numerous jokes at the expense of Bridget or even other aging characters, instead having them engage with one another in mature and sometimes existential manners, bringing out their inner souls and making them feel like better rounded characters rather than just retaining their one-note personalities.
The maturity of the film is profound, making it easier than before to identify with Bridget Jones and her journey to not just find love but to simply exist as the self-assured and confident woman that she is. Here, she isn’t judged for going after a younger man, with such a stigma being practically non-existent in this universe, nor is she put down for simply leading a slightly different lifestyle to some of the snobbier mothers at her kids’ school. Above all, her bright and shining optimism – portrayed as delightfully as ever by Zellweger – is celebrated at every turn, while her frustrations as a single parent and deeper remorse for her lost Darcy are both nurtured in ways that might genuinely get you choked up at one or two points. It’s a deeply emotional film, thanks to Morris’s direction which favours quieter and more tender moments rather than all-out embarrassing laughs (an approach that largely sank the much-maligned second entry, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason).
The film isn’t completely free of harping on past highs, as numerous moments and even clothing items like the see-through dress and enlarged underwear do force the nostalgia a little too heavily, but Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy does manage to stand on its own well enough to serve as a fitting coda to this character’s cinematic journey. It’s got plenty of genuine sweetness, warm chemistry between Zellweger and her love interest(s), charming side-characters and even the occasional banger on the soundtrack. Most of all, though, it’s a moving culmination that leaves the character in arguably a better place than last time, for even with her loss she’s managed to prove to the world, and most importantly herself, that she has what it takes to pick herself up and live the happy and fulfilling life that she wants and deserves.
For a film that shouldn’t work, it really does – and might just be the best possible choice at the movies this Valentine’s Day, or indeed any Valentine’s Day going forward.
SO, TO SUM UP…
Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy is an irresistibly sweet coda to the beloved character’s cinematic journey, with a profound and mature focus on what it is to love again after loss, and plenty of warmth radiating from Renée Zellweger’s delightful lead turn.
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