Pictureland

Those all-too-willing participants in reality shows have wrought even more damage than is obviously the case.  Of course, there is the mental toll:  billions of brain cells, lonely outposts of thought surrendering to the onslaught of gleeful indignity, seemingly as many as would drown in a Pacific of bad whisky, to the likes of the Kardashians, Real Housewives of Atlanta, New York, Orange County...the pawn shop owners, the late-to-the-party celebrities...ad nauseam.  All of this, presumably, to distract viewers from the pain, the loneliness, or just the oppressive banality of their lives.   Less obvious perhaps is the obscuring of the value of life stories wrought with any measure of thoughtfulness. Stories that not only distract us, remove us for a time from the pressing matters of our existence, but inevitably carry us back to a reflection on those same lives.  For however banal, uneventful, or ordinary... be it ever so humble, there is no story like ...

Richard Linklater's most impressive accomplishment with Bernie , his 14th (or so) full-length feature, might well be wrangling the outsized persona of Jack Black into a distinct, watchable character.  The success of this endeavor, beyond the considerable credit due to Mr. Black himself, may have something to do with the responsibility of portraying a living person.  That living person, Bernie Tiede, happens to be serving a life sentence in Texas.  In 1996, Tiede murdered his 81-year-old employer and companion, Marjorie Nugent.  Among images of the real-life principals of the case we see during the closing credits is a photo of Black meeting Tiede.   At the outset of Bernie , there is the faux folksiness of a title card which reads, "What you're fixin' to see is a true story."  Given Mr. Linklater's typically impressive handling of actors, professional and amateur alike, as well as the gentle comedy which ensues, it's hard to say whether one should ta...