Bernie

BERNIE

This movie has everything...A++

2011: Millennium Entertainment

2011, Comedy/Drama, Rated PG-13

Distributed by Millenium Entertainment

          Before I begin the review I'm going to just list off all the awesome things about this movie. Feel free to stop reading when one catches your eye and you realize that Bernie is totally worth seeing. Okay, first: it's directed by Richard Linklater. Linklater has directed so many incredible films in many different genres. He directed such classics as Dazed and Confused, Slacker, Waking Life, School of Rock and many others. Bernie demonstrates the return of Jack Black and Linklater together for the first time since School of Rock. Also, Matthew McConaughey hasn't starred in a Linklater film since his epic role in Dazed and Confused. Another reason this movie is awesome is that it has mockumentary elements. Many scenes are just interviews with people involved in the happenings of the plot. Another reason: it's based on a true story. This is the oddest story you'll come across in any film in recent years. It could only be that odd because it is true. Jack Black is the last reason I'll list here. He has proven time and time again (let's just pretend Gulliver's Travels never happened, shall we?) that he is an incredible actor and not just in the arena of comedy. Did anyone see The Big Year? Probably not because it flew under the radar. But it's great, and Jack Black does a superb job as the lead. Black does an amazing job in Bernie...just check out that mustache!

          Bernie is about an assistant funeral director named Bernhardt Tiede who is the bee's knees in his community (Carthage, Texas). Everyone loves him because he is just so nice and friendly. On the other hand, everyone hates the old widow Marge Nugent (Shirley McClaine) because she is just so mean and nasty. After Bernie conducts Marge's husband's funeral, Marge takes a liking to Bernie. She is elderly and Bernie is in his mid-thirties and yet they fall in love. They don't get married but Marge does hand over all her wealth (she's very rich) to Bernie in her will. She becomes controlling, however, and cuts Bernie off from all his friends and duties in the community. Bernie can't take it and one day he finally cracks and shoots her four times in the back. For a while he hides her body and plays it off like she's in the hospital. During that time however he does not run or hide. He steadily takes her money and puts it back into his community in various ways. That's the plot pretty much. I didn't technically give anything away because it's a true story and it can all be read about on the web.

          What makes the film so interesting is whether Bernie should be considered evil or not. That's the big question throughout the film, one that the viewer can't help but wrestle with in his or her mind. In the film, Marge is really, really mean to Bernie even though he does everything and more for her. She was at the end of her life anyway, right? And he didn't fly off to South America or some island in the Caribbean, he took all her money and put it into his community, making it much happier and healthier. I'm still struggling to decide whether Bernie should be in jail or not (I won't say the final verdict of the film even though it's easily obtainable information) after killing a very old, very mean, very rich widow. Obviously murder is wrong, but they wouldn't have made a film about it if the story was too clear-cut as to who is at fault and who is not. I liked that about the movie, though. Bernie is shown as evil and innocent. Marge is shown as both deserving and a victim of Bernie's killing her. Matthew McCaunoghey's character, Buck the D.A., is shown as both a good cop for holding up the law and incarcerating murderers, but he isn't Bernie: he doesn't know what it was like living with that awful woman.

         There isn't much else to say about the film itself: it's pretty much perfect. It's no Inception or Avatar (as in, it won't be the biggest film of the year) but as an indie comedy/drama you couldn't ask for more. Every actor, I mean every actor (even the little bit- part interviewees), does a fine job. Richard Linklater makes a beautifully eerie yet funny film, but I expected that. Sort of like what I said about Steven Soderbergh and Magic Mike: it's not a male stripper movie, it's just Soderbergh's next great film. Bernie isn't a movie about murder or funeral homes, it's just Linklater's next great film. Go see it, people...if you can find it. It was at Los Angeles Film Festival in 2011 and is just receiving limited distribution now.

 

          Side note: I really liked the ending of this film. During the credits we see the real Bernie and Marge together in a photo. Then we see the real Bernie in present day having a conversation with Jack Black. Cool stuff.