{"id":3760,"date":"2016-08-30T18:08:48","date_gmt":"2016-08-30T22:08:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=3760"},"modified":"2026-08-27T10:59:28","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T14:59:28","slug":"bernie-2011","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=3760","title":{"rendered":"Bernie-2011"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Bernie-2011<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Director Richard Linklater<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Starring Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, Matthew McConaughey<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Scott&#8217;s Review #472<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/70189906.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-3761\" src=\"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/70189906-210x300.jpg\" alt=\"70189906\" width=\"210\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/70189906-210x300.jpg 210w, https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/70189906.jpg 284w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 210px) 100vw, 210px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Reviewed August 30, 2016<\/p>\n<p><strong>Grade: C-<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Bernie (2011) is a film that, surprisingly, received critical acclaim and Golden Globe and Independent Spirit Award nominations, but I was left quite disappointed.<\/p>\n<p>Categorized as a dark comedy, it has a morbid premise, which isn&#8217;t the issue; I didn&#8217;t find it very good overall.<\/p>\n<p>Despite being a true story of Bernie (Jack Black) marrying and murdering millionaire Marjorie Nugent (Shirley MacLaine) in Texas, the film is not compelling and is written too over-the-top.<\/p>\n<p>Inexplicably, the townspeople refuse to believe Bernie&#8217;s obvious guilt.<\/p>\n<p>The film has a few funny, interesting moments and is based on real events, but I didn&#8217;t feel as connected to it as I expected and, honestly, found it a bit dull.<\/p>\n<p>Jack Black is impressive as the title character, but only because it is a departure from his usual slapstick film roles. I don&#8217;t get the accolades being heaped on him for his performance.<\/p>\n<p>Shirley MacLaine and Matthew McConaughey are capable of the parts written for them, but they are one-note characters.<\/p>\n<p>Meh.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Independent Spirit Award Nominations:\u00a0<\/strong>Best Feature, Best Male Lead-Jack Black<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bernie-2011 Director Richard Linklater Starring Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, Matthew McConaughey Scott&#8217;s Review #472 Reviewed August 30, 2016 Grade: C- Bernie (2011) is a film that, surprisingly, received critical acclaim and Golden Globe and Independent Spirit Award nominations, but I was left quite disappointed. Categorized as a dark comedy, it has a morbid premise, which &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=3760\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Bernie-2011<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82,158,49,179,41,215],"tags":[2678,2128,3309,676],"class_list":["post-3760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2011-films","category-bios","category-comedies","category-darkcomedies","category-indiefilms","category-indie-comedies","tag-jack-black","tag-matthew-mcconaughey","tag-richard-linklater","tag-shirley-maclaine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3760"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24222,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3760\/revisions\/24222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}