Bridge Jones, walking social faux pas, is back and as funny as ever. Set four weeks (and 71 shags) after the first film we find Bridget happily in love with straight laced human rights lawyer Mark Darcy, but even in these early days of the marriage Bridget’s insecurity makes for jealousy and the relationship is on shaky ground.
Waiting in the wings is the smooth and sexy Daniel Cleaver with a fetish for big underpants and, well anything with two legs really. Can Bridget overcome magic mushrooms, dreadful skiing holidays, high society dinners and Daniel Cleavers charming way to end up back in the arms of the man she is destined to be with?
The front is day.
From the perspective of a male viewer, Bridget Jones 2 - The Edge of Reason is little more than an amusing and entertaining romantic comedy. It never crossed my mind that it was written as somewhat of an anthem for the modern 30 something woman.
So, when discussing this movie with a female friend she expressed her displeasure at what the sequel was by explaining that the original movie was “sociological examination of something that many over 30's single women experience”, and that the sequel was a fluff filled let down and “singing Madonna songs in the Bangkok Hilton was too trite for words". That will teach me to ask for insights into romantic comedies from the target audience, back to Resident Evil 2 for me.
"I truly believe that happiness is possible... even when you're thirty-three and have a bottom the size of two bowling balls."
Video
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Bridget Jones 2 - The Edge of Reason is presented on this DVD in the original theatrical aspect ratio of 2.35:1 and is enhanced for widescreen displays.
Impatient viewers who like to load up a DVD and get straight into the movie may find the menu on this disc a little trying as it spends a good thirty seconds animating pictures of Bridget, Mark and Daniel around the screen. These sort of animated menus are fun the first time but just get old and annoying on subsequent plays, especially when they go through their paces every time you return to the menu for whatever reason.
Twinkle twinkle little star, hope I wore a decent bra.
For a recently produced movie the video quality on this disc is unfortunately bordering on substandard. There are numerous visible problems with the transfer with aliasing and pixelation rearing their ugly digital heads more than once.
The picture is nice and sharp in facial close-ups but overall tends to be a little soft on wide shots; this softness is especially obvious during the opening scenes of the movie but does improve significantly from there.
It’s not all bad though, the colour balance is excellent throughout with skin tones appearing natural and realistic. The colours really shine in the scenes shot in Thailand with reds, greens and yellows appearing vibrant and accurate.
Finally the rather messy layer change appears at the 71:06 minute mark just on the cusp of some dialogue making it almost appear as if something was lost during the transition, I actually had to review the section again to make sure no time was skipped (which it wasn’t).
Audio
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In contrast to the rather disappointing video transfer the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio mix on this disc is superb.
Since the main focus of the movie is on dialogue the centre channel obviously gets the most attention and conveys the spoken parts clearly without any problem. Of particular note is the ubiquitous Bridget Jones voice over which has become a trademark of the franchise is also perfectly presented loud and clear through the centre and main channels.
Charlies best-be-forgotten Angels.
The bass and surround channels are mainly used for the usual environmental and ambient noise without being overbearing or obvious giving us just the right atmosphere when combined with the musical score mainly consisting of early 90’s cover songs.
Extras
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The Special Features section of this DVD is split up into 3 areas: Bridget Jones, Daniel Cleaver and Mark Darcy. The sections aren’t strictly necessary but they do loosely group the numerous features into a logical area under each main character.
Bridget Jones Commentary with Director Beeban Kidron
This full length commentary by Director Beeban Kidron includes a lot of comments on how the first film influenced this as well as the usual comments on casting, locations and filming. Beeban professes a love for the DVD format mainly for the reason that it gives the filmmaker a way to share their full vision with the viewers by including deleted scenes which she highlights quite often during the commentary.
The mini break to Austria (3:58)
This short featurette shows behind the scenes footage of the filming on location in Austria including comments and short interviews with the cast and crew describing the scenes and the locations used during this part of the filming of the movie.
Is there ever too much Hugh Grant? Nein!!!
Deleted Scenes (13:05)
Four quite lengthy scenes that were cut from the theatrical version of the movie featuring Bridget fox hunting (an alternative to her skydiving in the theatrical cut), at a Christening, an alternate beginning to the movie and one of Bridget’s famous fantasies.
Daniel Cleaver A smooth guide to exotic Thailand (4:28)
Similar to the Austrian on location feature in the previous section this featurette gives us some behind the scenes footage of the location shoot in Thailand with interviews of cast and crew.
The big fight
What would a Bridget Jones movie be without Darcy and Cleaver clumsily kicking and punching each other in a public place? This short featurette includes interviews mainly with Grant and Firth discussing their on screen and off screen relationships.
Who’s your man! Quiz
This quiz is a series of questions with multiple choice answers which will eventually tell the viewer who there perfect man is, apparently Mark Darcy is the guy for me. The quiz is accessible from the features menu or alternatively it can be integrated into the movie where the questions pop up after certain scenes, you give an answer using the DVD remote and then proceed with the movie, at the end you are told who your man is. An interesting feature but I’d always thought I was a more a Hugh Grant kind of guy, you learn something new every day!
Mark Darcy Mark and Bridget: Forever? (5:25)
This short section focuses on the relationship between Mark and Bridget featuring interviews with cast and crew in a similar style to all the other special features on this disc.
The purple people eaters - it's subliminal.
Bridget Jones interviews Colin Firth
The book on which this movie was based featured Bridget doing an interview with Colin Firth. This scene was not originally intended to be in the movie but apparently the fans demanded it and while the final version didn’t make it into the feature it did make it onto the DVD. One night after filming Zellweger stayed in character as Bridget and Firth changed cloths and became himself to film this hilarious interview.
Lonely London
The Visual Effects Producer for the movie, Alex Hope runs us through the process involved in filming the “Lonely London” sequence in the movie along with some comments from the Director.
To round off the extras package there are theatrical trailers for Wimbledon and Meet the Fockers.
Overall
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By all accounts this film version of Edge of Reason isn’t incredibly faithful to the book of the same name with a considerable amount of Hollywood added for comedic and romantic effect. This may be a let down for fans of the books and the original movie but to each her own. I enjoyed Bridget Jones 2 - The Edge of Reason and it has nothing to do with a fetish for large underwear, I swear!
While the video transfer on this disc is a disappointment the rest of the package makes up for the shortfalls with an excellent collection of special features and an outstanding audio presentation that fans of Bridget Jones will be happy to own.
