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Looking back, it’s amusing to think that the casting of the very American Renée Zellweger as author Helen Fielding’s British heroine was such a bone of contention for fans when Bridget Jones’s Diary was released in 2001. That film kicked off Zellweger’s three-year dance with Oscar, culminating in a Supporting Actress win for Cold Mountain (her third consecutive nomination). Yet, in the years since, Zellweger’s profile has diminished, and her Oscar-winning performance is remembered more for her over-the-top accent than as a career highlight.

Instead, her role as neurotic self-professed “spinster” Bridget Jones remains one of Zellweger’s most indelible, in part since she reprised it for the ill-received sequel Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason in 2004. However, now poised to return to the spotlight full-force after a six-year absence, Zellweger circles back to the character with Bridget Jones’s Baby,...