Bernie: Critic Reviews

All those twangy, homespun observations interrupt and annotate the narrative until Black and MacLaine's scenes start to feel as trivial as reenactments on a true-crime TV show.

A sordid, bleak tale about two lonely people drawn to each other like colliding planets.

"Bernie" unfolds into many equally rich narrative strands: love story, southern Gothic slice-of-life and, finally tragedy and legal thriller...

The movie's bright and endearing and surprisingly lacking in a point. I wish I liked it better, but it's a start.

A chafing, rock-in-the-shoe kind of movie -- and I mean this as a compliment.

A movie that may not ultimately add up to much, but which is filled with wonderfully odd details of weird Americana.

The movie itself, a partly true and cheerfully embellished account of a Texas murder case, presents a case of narrative drift.

Watching Bernie is a little like sitting on a shady front porch and gossiping with the town tattlers.

Bernie has chuckles, but it's hardly riotous. And this is a good thing.

Even at its most charming as a defense of small-town eccentrics and Texas-style legal process, the film plays a little slowly.

A jovial yet gracefully told tale.

Linklater has made a smart movie, with a mordant satirical edge, but he almost falls victim to his own sense of authenticity.

I had to forget what I knew about Black. He creates this character out of thin air, it's like nothing he's done before, and it proves that an actor can be a miraculous thing in the right role.

Linklater's a glider, not a pile-driver; he hangs back when other directors prefer to bore in.

Some of the best performances come from real-life residents of Carthage as they share their recollections on camera.

[A] weirdly funny, inspiring film.

A one-of-a-kind comedy based on the real homicide of an innocent old lady.

"Bernie' isn't a monumental film, but it is a finely tuned character study with some nice innovations.

A dead-solid-perfect depiction of small-town life.

I, for one, eagerly await the sequel to Bernie.

Pitch-perfect performances by Shirley MacLaine and an unusually restrained Jack Black hold together this offbeat true-crime saga, but Linklater's keen eye for human eccentricity flowers most memorably on the periphery.

Jack Black gives the performance of his career in the title role of "Bernie"...

Bernie isn't a particularly likeable guy and Black's opaque performance never lets us get beneath the surface to find a character we might actually care about.

Propelled by a perfectly cast trio of stars whose eccentricities shine in singular character roles, Bernie is charmer.