How Bridget Jones made me think about death (again)
This post contains spoilers
A couple of months ago Tom said he’d like to watch Bridget Jones’s Baby, he was in the mood for a romcom, and I thought, why not? It wasn’t bad (don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t good either) but I was happy to spend two hours with Bridge and Marc Darcy again; like visiting old friends.
Then there were rumours about a fourth film. I watched the trailer for Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy and thought that it looked alright, even fun perhaps. Tom said he was dying to watch it, and we went. We cried before the opening credits; that must be some sort of record. The thing is, the new Bridget Jones is about grief, and they really nailed it.
There is a scene in one of my favourite films, When Harry Met Sally, it’s in the very beginning, when they drive from Washington to New York in what Sally later describes as the ‘longest night of her life’:
Harry: …Do you ever think about death?
Sally: Yes.
Harry: Sure you do, a fleeting thought that jumps in and
out of the transient of your mind. I spend hours, I spend days...
Sally: And you think that makes you a better person.
Harry: Look, when the shit comes down I'm gonna be prepared and you're not that's all I'm saying.
Sally is right, that doesn’t mean I am deep or anything, but like Harry, I do think a lot about it. I’ve listened to Griefcast, I read both of Julia Samuel’s books, This Too Shall Pass and Grief Works; Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Notes on Grief is a beautiful short manual on it; the other week I went to an event about a book called The Happy Death Club – you get the gist.
I’m terrified of my loved ones dying, and I always think the worst when I check an unread text. Once Tom didn’t reply to a late-night message and I was convinced I’d have to go and search for him the next day, going up and down the canal as I didn’t know the exact location of his boat at the time. He’d fallen asleep – and that should have been the obvious conclusion to my fears. People aren’t late because they’ve been hit by a bus, it is far more likely that it was due to train delays - go try and tell that to my brain.
Once you experience death, you see it everywhere. That’s why loving it’s so hard, because once you love you know you will lose it eventually, one way or another, it will die. Sorry, that got dark.
In life, you can experience the same death over and over again, shedding that grief skin year after year. I am now approaching the age my mum was when my dad passed, and I can’t help but wonder what it must have felt like for her back then. This movie made me see that.
From being a stay-at-home mum, to getting back to work as a single mum, it shows the struggles of doing it on your own. Not just the challenge of doing it alone but having to adapt to it, when the plan was for parenthood to be a double act. * Parents’ meetings, events with mums and kids that won’t shut up; your other half isn’t around, and you want to hug them and curse them at the same time. ‘Why did you die on me, WHY?’
*My mum and my dad, I am not saying that parenthood is made of a woman and a man so please don’t cancel me just yet!
From his deathbed, Bridget’s dad says, (Jim Broadbent DIES before the opening credits – NOT FAIR, tears everywhere), that she shouldn’t just survive, but live instead. So, she ends up having sex with a much younger man. I’m joking, there is much more to it, I swear. The boy Bridget gets involved with is very cute (and my mum has a crush on him - so hopefully she can live vicariously through Bridge), but the film is not about him.
My mum, on the other hand, did not find a lover who looked like Leo Woodall; she took us on adventures, to caves, waterfalls and beaches in Brazil. She wanted us not to be afraid, to live our best lives – whatever that looked like.
Till this day my mum apologises for not being present when we were growing up. Saying that she missed out on things because she was working so much (to support us!) I don’t remember as such. I remember her being there for the main events. Like my dad, she was everywhere.
I was moved by watching Bridget’s group of friends. Even though they don’t have that much screen time, they are always there. I think about my friends who have carried me from afar, who have picked up the phone, texted, sent flowers and showed up. Liaising amongst themselves to check on how I was, who brought me bubbly and hugs. Who have held me in bed till I cried myself to sleep. If that’s not love, I don’t know what it is.
Bridget: People talk about moving on like it means, you know, leaving something behind, you know, leaving someone you love behind, but perhaps it’s more that suddenly you see, you can live at the same time as all the things you’ve lost, and that you can be happy even without them.
Like death, we are allowed to experience a new breath of life several times; we are given second chances and new tries. We move on, and that doesn’t mean forgetting the past. Bridget is not by herself in the end – and neither are we. We’re going to be okay - trust me on that.