Pun Salad

The plot revolves around a barely-fictionalized true murder, and yet it's a comedy. A dark comedy, true, but not as dark as you might think. Rated PG-13, for (as the MPAA puts it) "some violent images and brief strong language."

Jack Black plays Bernie, a funeral home worker who charms just about everyone in the small East Texas town of Carthage. He has deep roots in the community, and a beautiful hymn-singing voice that he deploys at church services, funeral services, and just while he's driving around town.

Bernie's usual practice is to console and support grieving family members of the recently deceased that pass under his care. But he develops a deeper-than-usual acquaintance with rich widow Marjorie Nugent (Shirley MacLaine!) after her husband's funeral. While Marjorie is poisonously hostile to nearly everyone else, she eventually takes a shine to Bernie. Over the years, he becomes her constant daily companion. But their relationship turns sour and, eventually, deadly.

The movie is shot in semi-documentary style, with frequent breaks for true-crime-style interviews with townsfolk and relations. (Some of the interviewees are actors, others are actual citizens of Carthage; I couldn't pick out which were which.)

It's fun, although you probably have to shut down the moral-judgment part of your brain for true enjoyment. I read up on the actual case at Wikipedia and (indeed) the movie leaves out or underplays a few sordid details that would have made it a lot less amusing. The real Bernie did get convicted of first-degree murder; the movie provides no insight into how that serious charge was justifiable, and implies it wasn't.

Matthew McConaughey has an unglamourous role as the crusading prosecuting attorney, Danny Buck. Unlike every other Matthew McConaughey role I've seen, his shirt stays on for the entire movie.