After seeing Bridget Jones's Diary I have come to a decision about my love life. Since apparently all it takes to attract extraordinarily handsome British guys is to be yourself, I resolve to do the following:

	No more futile attempts at looking sexy. 'Cause let's face it, I can do cute but I can't seem to pull off sexy. (The editor is warned not to mention a pair of dresses, one red and one dark grey, that I have worn in the past, since I'm trying to make a joke. And besides, those dresses would make Gandhi look like a sexpot.)
	No more drinking. (This, also, is obviously a joke. At this point, I stick to drinking only Mike's Hard Lemonade®, and I can only have two of them at a time, since I hold my liquor about as well as a pair of fishnet stockings.)
	No more smoking. (Also, a joke. I only smoke when set on fire.)
	Try to lose weight. (Yet another joke. I may not have Calista Flockhart's patented look, in which a person who turns sideways completely disappears, but the only way I'd lose ten pounds is if I cut off my own head.)

So they're lame resolutions. They worked for Bridget Jones.

Bridget, played by Renee Zellwegger -- who gained 25 pounds so that she could look like a normal woman -- has horrible taste in men. Well, all right, it's not that horrible. First, she lusts after her boss Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant, adorably slimy). He shares all her vices -- smoking, drinking, continual displays of public embarrassment -- and is the complete opposite of stuffy Mark Darcy, Bridget's childhood neighbor.

All the Pride and Prejudice junkies out there need to know that Colin Firth plays Mark Darcy, and I'd just like to say that ... um ... well… I think my feelings on the subject of Colin Firth in this movie can best be summed up by that "gaaaaa" noise Homer Simpson makes in reference to anything both edible and delicious.

OK, now that I finished the abject fawning part of the review, back to the story. Bridget falls for Daniel hard, and when she comes back from a Tarts and Vicars party (Where exactly do people come up with this stuff?) to find him with another woman, it breaks her heart. Enter Darcy -- over and over again, since he apparently knows no one she's not friends with -- who tells her that he likes her "just as she is." This is how single people know it's fiction.

I didn't read the book yet -- an admission that'll probably shock anyone who's known me for more than five minutes -- so I can't tell you if the book is any better than that. But the movie managed to be steadily funny for two hours straight, so you should go see it. So sayeth the real me.

Jennifer Matarese

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