Bernie (2011)

Based on a true story that first caught director Richard Linklater’s attention in Texas Monthly magazine, Bernie (the film) is quirky and droll while it earnestly depicts the puzzling psyche of Bernie (the man). Jack Black aptly plays the doughy and affable Bernie Tiede, who lived in Carthage, Texas, as the quintessential “nicest guy in town” until he shot his closest friend and companion, the “meanest woman in town” (played by Shirley MacLaine), who he had charmed into becoming passably sociable (though the charm apparently didn’t hold). So much did the townsfolk appreciate and support Bernie that the prosecution felt it had to move the trial to another venue to obtain a conviction. Actual townsfolk play themselves in the movie, nattering about what was good or odd about Bernie. (Was he gay? Some men thought him a namby-pamby but in the women’s consensus “That dog don’t hunt.”) Jack Black is understatedly brilliant in this juicy dramatic role that he seems born to deliver. As Bernie, he is the sensitive, unctuous, discreet assistant funeral director who does whatever it takes to give the deceased and his or her loved ones a reverential funeral experience. He even steps in for a missing organist, leads the congregation in singing hymns, and sings hymns while driving. (Not just a line or two of a hymn – he sings entire hymns, complete with crescendo, decrescendo, vibrato, falsetto, and all those other Italian words. He is basically Bill Murray’s character in Groundhog Day if he had a come-to-Jesus encounter.) How Bernie’s constantly self-effacing nature led to the incident where he momentarily snapped is to me the central theme of this movie. The moral of the story is not so simple as “If a guy as nice as Bernie could snap, then any one of us could snap.” Rather, I suggest, it is how continuous and microscopic episodes of self-denial (or any state of denial), however well-intentioned, can fulminate into a contusional break from reality and, yes, even murder. Bernie (the man) is portrayed with incredible nuance and sensitivity that fascinates me a week after seeing Bernie (the film) on its release weekend in Austin, Texas. Nor was it not lost on me that, throughout the film, Bernie endures his trials to the crucifixional strains of “O Sacred Head Surrounded.” 5 stars. (5-3-12)