Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

This weekend, we went to the cinema (which we rarely do), and saw a very fine film, but I’m not going to tell you about it.

Instead, I’m going to tell you about Bernie because, as good as that other movie is, the movie you really need to see is Bernie, starring Jack Black.

Now before you get all wrinkle-nosed about Jack Black, hear me out.

If your only exposure to Jack Black has been via Tenacious D and trailers for Nacho Libre, I can understand if you think he’s just a funny-man with a juvenile sense of humor. His personality is definitely super-sized and, for most of us, that’s all we’ve seen: the over-the-top, crazy-eyed, usually inappropriate bravado that is the Jack Black persona.

There’s more to Jack, though, and as proof I give you Bernie.

Distinct from all those movies filled with fart-based humor, Black has built a CV filled with an exceedingly broad range of characters, from the ridiculous to poignant. Comic or tragic, Black’s supporting roles have enhanced such films as High Fidelity and Tropic Thunder, but even that sells his talents short, as he’s excelled in major roles in very good films like The Holiday and School of Rock. These latter films are often waved off as standard rom-com or genre fare, but almost every one has more heart than you’d expect, and Black consistently brings more depth to each character than the genre requires.

In short, the guy brings it.

And Bernie is his best work I’ve seen to date.

Based on a true story, Black plays the real-life individual Bernie Tiede. Bernie was an assistant funeral director in Carthage, in Eastern Texas, and by all accounts from neighbors and friends, was a kind, loving, and generous man who truly cared for the people of his little town. He doted on the town’s Little Old Ladies–widows and soon-to-be widows–and worked in community projects from church choirs to drama groups. When he befriended the town’s rich (and ornery) widow, Marjorie Nugent (Shirley MacLaine), the town gossips remarked that only Bernie could be friends with such an unpleasant woman. He was so well-loved, in fact, that later, when Marjorie shows up tucked in under the corn in her deep-freeze and Bernie confesses to having shot her in the back, the town still rallied around him, choosing to either disbelieve the facts or believe that if anyone had it coming, it was Marjorie.

Yes. This is a true story.

Director Richard Linklater and journalist Skip Hollandsworth (who reported the story when it happened) worked for nearly twenty years to bring this story to the screen. Linklater, a Texas native himself, was eager to tell this story. It is a truly distinctive Texas tale, in which facts do not define reality and someone’s worth is based on their history, not one admittedly bad act.

The reason I loved this film is that the characters were so surprising. Linklater employs a Greek chorus formed in part by actual residents of Carthage, TX, many of whom actually knew Bernie and Marjorie, and their interspersed commentary not only emphasizes the movie’s “ripped from the headlines” origin, but brings a verisimilitude to the dialogue that only true East Texans can provide. The dignity of these often large and unlovely folks of bad hair and poor fashion sense is undeniable, and their reminiscences of both Bernie and Marjorie (not to mention their opinions of folks in other areas of East Texas) are priceless for their humor and their colloquial flair.

Yet, it’s more than just the gossips; all the characters are thoroughly rounded out. MacLaine’s Nugent is so complicated and conflicted that I ping-ponged between pity and empathy, finally settling on a mixture of both. McConaughey’s “Danny Buck” was hilarious as he tried to understand why he was having trouble prosecuting a man who confessed to shooting a little old lady four times in the back.

But it is Black himself who carries this film, because he is able (with Linklater’s deft and unobtrusive direction) to bring us along with him as he endeavors to help and to care for and to support his friend Marjorie. His (innocent) intentions are clear, but so is the way his reserves are eroded by Marjorie’s increasingly vituperative nature. Her meanness, manipulation, and controlling ways build up a prison of disdain until, when Bernie picks up the gun, we’re not sure if he’s fantasizing or acting, and neither (it seems) is he.

Until she shows up in the freezer, of course.

I’ve screened a handful of comédies noires of late, but Black’s Bernie is at the top of the heap. Give it a chance, and you’ll see what I mean.

k