 When Bridget stops at a mall to see her mother, she begins the scene  by saying (in a voice over) that, "It is a truth universally  acknowledged that as soon as one part of your life starts looking  up, another part falls to pieces." This is an update of the famous  opening lines of Jane Austen (I) (qv)s Pride and Prejudice: "It  is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession  of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."