A Feminist Reading of Bridget Jones's Diary

The film Bridget Jones's Diary depicts a year of Bridget Jones's life as dictated to us, the viewer, through her diary. During the duration of the film, you see how Bridget falls in love with Daniel, is heartbroken by him, and then discovers her love for Mark Darcy. Along the way she is trying to find herself, and feel comfortable in her own skin.

The film itself tries to suppress Bridget, and in many aspects succeeds. There are, however, points in the film where she is able to escape the male gaze and have some agency.

When Bridget begins to get the attention of co-worker Daniel, she immediately begins to change her behavior in order to win his affection. She starts to come to work in tight mini-skirts and sheer tops, in order to participate in a flirtatious game with Daniel. Although the clothing that Bridget wears in the office may seem risqué, it is, in fact, still controlled by the male gaze's need to suppress her agency.

"Especially in romantic comedies, costumers tend to put heroines in silly, instantly likable, nonthreatening clothes…to attempt to hide and therefore uneroticize the actress…" (Zacharek). Although Bridget starts to wear more revealing clothing, it always seems to highlight her most unflattering places on her body.

By using these clothes, Bridget is giving the impression that she is in control of the game she is playing with Daniel, when in reality she is being oppressed by the film's male gaze, "…a separation of the erotic identity of the subject from the object on the screen (active scopophilia)…" (Mulvey 61). This shows exactly how the viewer has to separate Bridget from a sexual subject in order to objectify her within the male gaze.

Another objectifying component to this film is the fact that when the camera focuses on her clothing that it only views portions of her body.

Bridget, although being unhappy with her appearance, has no problem being open about her love for sex. In one scene she is in bed with Daniel and answers her phone; "Bridget Jones Wanted Sex Goddess" clearly defining her as "…a girl who unapologetically enjoys sex." (Zacharek). Bridget's relationship with Daniel never matures past the lust phase.

They are constantly making dates to sleep together, and even when Daniel takes her to the countryside to get away they sleep together, and when the comment of love is made Daniel heads for the door to leave. It is clear to the viewer that Bridget is being punished for trying to attract Daniel. She is stuck in a miserable pseudo-relationship with a man who has no long term interest in her, and because she dared to pursue him she must be punished by the logic of the film.

When Bridget and Daniel finally break it off she beings to show signs that she is going to truly be in control of her life now. She throws out all of her books on how to find men, and replaces them with books about how to be happy with yourself. The viewer feels pity for Bridget, but is now rooting for her to become a better woman because of her hardships. The most prominent change however is that she quits her job to take a job as a TV newswoman, and also to get away from Daniel.

While on the job she is constantly making a spectacle of herself on camera, by having her arse hit the camera as she slides down a fireman's pole. This scene makes Bridget an object to the viewer, "Thus she turns herself into an object-and most particularly an object of vision: a sight." (Berger). Bridget is punished by the film, and this is shown in the scene where she is replaying her newscast in her apartment, over and over again.

To many people in the film Bridget is simply just a 30 year old, single, overweight, mental wreck who personifies all women who are in this position. Strict gender codes have locked Bridget in to a stereotype in the minds of her friends, family, and colleagues, and "sex stereotyping is not a matter of intuition or self-evidence.

Detection of sex stereotypes requires knowledge of gender codes…" (Robert). This statement proves that Bridget is not inherently pathetic, that her situation is to blame for her current state, and that the gender codes that are being forced upon her are causing most of the mental anguish in her life. According to her friends someone Bridget's age should be married and have children already, which makes Bridget feel like a sphincter.

The one break that Bridget gets as a character in the film is when she gets to interview the couple that could have been deported to face death in their country. This is one of the most important points in the film because it establishes Bridget as a major player in the field of TV journalism. The unsettling factor to this situation is that she was not going to get the interview initially.

She went to a convenience store to get a pack of cigarettes and in turn misses the couple coming out of the courthouse. She turns around to see Mark Darcy, who happens to be representing the couple in court, and he is able to get her the interview. This is another subtle punishment made by the film to Bridget.

She is given the leeway to get a respectable TV newswoman job, but cannot establish herself in the world of serious journalism without the help of Mark Darcy. Mark becomes the conduit for Bridget's success, therefore keeping her within the male gaze in terms of the film.

In conclusion, Bridget Jones is a character who tries to escape the male gaze of the cinema. During various points in the film she successfully does this, but in the end, winds up a bare-assed sexual object running through the snowy streets of London, chasing after a man.

She finally settles with a man, Mark Darcy, which puts her in her "right" place within the logic of the film. The film sets out to show that in the end she is placed in the relationship that her friends and family feel she should be in. She is placed back in to position with in the politics of the gender codes for a 30 year old single woman. Bridget tries to escape this process, but in the end is ultimately punished for trying to have agency in the film.

Her actions and emotions are dominated by the men in her life; she relies on Darcy in order to find her success within her career, and quits her job with Daniel because of her feelings for him. Every time that she tries to become an independent entity separate from the male patriarchal gaze that is placed on her, she is punished by the logic of the film. She is humiliated publicly on her TV program, and then proceeds to replay the scene 4 times to herself in order to make herself feel like more of a fool than she already does from the incident.

She is cheated on by Daniel, she walks in to his apartment while he has another woman there, in this she is punished for trying to love Daniel, who is by the logic of the film, too good for her. The way she dresses, and the camera's view of her are also punishing to Bridgette. The camera chops up her body by only showing segments of her such as her skirt, or her sheer top. This view, along with the clothing that she is wearing is another conduit to suppress her and put her back in to her place within the male gaze.

Bridget Jones, in the end, can not escape the male gaze of the film. She is constantly being objectified through the situations that she is placed in, and by the people she interacts with. Bridget makes an honorable attempt to break away from patriarchal societal views that are confining her to her gender stereotypes, but inevitably fails within the logic of the film.