Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Victoria's Statewide Mornings program on February 20, 2025.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Michael Morris

Cast: Renée Zellweger, Mila Jankovic, Casper Knopf, Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Leo Woodall, Colin Firth.

Some nights, they could sit and watch the UFOs for the hours.

I honestly don't know if I've seen a Bridget Jones film before. I feel like I have, and watching the inevitable polaroids of past movies flash up amid the credits gave me a sense of deja vu. And it's possible I reviewed one or two of them back in the day. But maybe I haven't seen them. The first film was certainly so zeitgeisty, so embedded in the pop culture consciousness, that maybe I absorbed it by osmosis without ever actually watching it.

Zellweger's Bridget is such an eminently understandable and relatable character - the ultimate everywoman - that she is part of the fabric of cinema now. You know her without having seen (or remembering if you've seen) any of her films. And that also means you don't need to have seen the previous Bridget Jones movies to be wooed by this one.

But watching Mad About The Boy (the fourth instalment in the series) makes me want to watch the rest of them. It's a fun, sparky rom-com with an utterly charming lead, but it's also a beautiful meditation on grief and the ups-and-downs of parenting and mid-life living.

The fourth film finds Bridget as a single mother-of-two, grappling with all the things that come with being a single mother-of-two in 2025. When a much-younger man meet-cutes his way into her world, she wonders if this is exactly what she's been waiting for. 

Mad About The Boy's best bits are the surprisingly poignant explorations of grief that swirl throughout Bridget's often chaotic and comedic existence. Yes, it's funny, yes, it's charmingly silly, and yes, Bridget is endearing and easy to identify with. But there is some truly magical writing in here that manages to distil so much about loss into some sparkling and home-hitting dialogue.

And when it's not finding ways to carry on in the face of the ultimate heartache, it's got some sweet things to say about living your best life in the face of modern middle-class pressure. Which brings me to the biggest problem with the film: parts of Bridget's life are too comfortable and good things come to her too easily. Mad About The Boy digs up regular embarrassments to keep Bridget on our level, but when she decides to turn her life around, it doesn't take much for that to happen.

But if you're not here for the life lessons, there are plenty of laughs. Grant returns as her caddish ex-suitor-now-best friend Daniel, and adds spark every time he's on the screen, and Thompson makes the most of her cameo moments. 

Zellweger seems effortlessly at home in Bridget's skin. A world away from her last big-screen performance as Judy Garland in 2019's Judy, it's another reminder not only of Zellweger's comedic skill but of her chameleonic abilities. This is the fourth time in the role, and maybe it's all the easier for the repetition, but Bridget Jones never feels anything less than a real and wonderfully adorkable person.

  

Rom-coms are an oft-derided genre but sometimes they capture something beautiful about the human condition amid the schmaltz. And Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy manages to have the lolz and the love, while also giving us something thoughtful about life.

Conclave

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Victoria's Statewide Mornings program on January 22, 2025.

(PG) ★★★★

Director: Edward Berger.

Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Sergio Castellitto, Isabella Rossellini, Lucian Msamati, Carlos Diehz, Brían F. O'Byrne, Jacek Koman, Merab Ninidze.

At any moment, a well-choreographed dance routine was about to break out.

Sometimes a movie makes you feel like you're prying into a world you're not supposed to see.

Such is the case with Conclave, a "political thriller" that's unlike any other political thriller you can probably think of - its politics are unique, and its thrills are mostly lowkey, but no less thrilling for this fact. 

The film takes us inside the decision-making process that selects a new pope. It's like the election for a high school class president, but with weirder costumes and more Latin. And it's endlessly fascinating, not just for its peak into a world most mere mortals will never see, but for its considerations about the Catholic Church's strange position trapped between its traditions and the modern world.

While it's thematically about politics, popularity and power, it's very much about the Church - it's about faith, doubt, a higher calling, and the limitations and expectations of tradition, and how all of that rubs up against the very human traits of ambition and greed.

Central to the story is Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Fiennes), the man in charge of getting all the cardinals in one room and casting their vote for a new Pope.

Around him are a colourful array of cardinals vying for the position of top dog - Tucci's determined liberal, Lithgow's ambitious moderate, Castellito's fire-and-brimstone traditionalist, Msamati's popular conservative, and Diehz's little-known dark horse.

Peter Straughan's script, based on Robert Harris' book, throws in casual intrusions from the outside world to ensure the intrigue continues, and everything moves at a comfortable pace so you won't even notice you're on tenterhooks.

The great screenplay is heightened by some great performances, but the cinematography really helps us get into the heads of characters. There are a lot of close-ups of Fiennes, and it never ceases to amaze how he can convey so much with so little. His is not a flashy performance - a lot of it takes places behind the eyes. But Berger's camera captures that, giving us another great Fiennes turn in a very long list of great Fiennes turns. 

He's ably supported by a cast that could easily have stolen the show, were it not for Fiennes' commanding yet comfortable performance. Tucci, Lithgow and Rossellini are no slouches, and as great as you'd expect, while Castellito, Msamati and Diehz are also excellent.

Volker Bertelmann's score is quite powerful in places, subtle in others, and does a stellar job of enhancing the mood throughout. Also, major kudos to the team that turned Cinecittà Studios into a replica Vatican - you wouldn't know it wasn't the real thing. 

Conclave's plot has moments that may tip you out of the reality of the film. The final act will definitely test some people's suspension of disbelief, especially the ending, but it remains fascinating and thought-provoking nonetheless.

All in all, a fascinating sermon on the state of the Church and its place in the world, with a Fiennes performance worthy of being put on an altar.

Amen.