Before we get into this third sequel, let’s brush up a bit on the franchise’s loooong history. The original 2001 flick, based on Helen Fielding’s hit novel, was about an unmarried 30-something Englishwoman looking for love who has to choose between an entertaining rotter and a staid but stable (okay, boring) gent. I liked it in part because of the Brits’ apoplectic reaction to the casting of Renee Zellweger, a bloody Yank, in the title role. Great time at the movies, even for a rom-com.

But the film industry cannot seem to leave success alone, and 2004 saw the inevitable cash-grab in Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, and in 2016 we had the slightly better Bridget Jones’s Baby, in which our heroine is pregnant but unsure which of two suitors is the father.

Now, 24 years after the first diary entry, Bridget is the widowed mother of two and easing back into the dating scene, still looking for Mr. Right. As the title indicates, one hopeful is a much younger and very hunky charmer (Leo Woodall). The other is her son’s science teacher (Chiwetel Ejiofor).

All the above said, this one, second-best only to the original, can be enjoyed as a stand-alone because, as with all the Bridget movies, it rides largely on the unique, squeaky charm of Renee Zellweger. It’s a lovely return to the chaos that seems to surround the character. It’s schmaltzy, of course, but unabashedly so, in the Love, Actually way the Brits never get tired of. The comic timing’s good; it’s never dull; and the kids are mostly not annoying. Mostly. (124 min)