{"id":1521,"date":"2024-08-03T04:51:20","date_gmt":"2024-08-03T04:51:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=1521"},"modified":"2024-10-13T18:39:37","modified_gmt":"2024-10-13T22:39:37","slug":"weekend-at-bernies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/08\/03\/weekend-at-bernies\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekend at Bernie\u2019s"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Weekend at Bernie\u2019s <\/strong>(1989)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 20th<\/sup> Century Fox\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 98 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (language, comic violence, sexual content, abuse of a corpse)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ted Kotcheff\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Robert Klane\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Andy Summers\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Francois Protat\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 5, 1989 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Andrew McCarthy, Jonathan Silverman, Catherine Mary Stewart, Terry Kiser, Don Calfa, Catherine Parks, Eloise Broady, Gregory Salata, Louis Giambalvo, Ted Kotcheff, Jason Woliner.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $30.2M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *** \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0Never has abuse of a corpse been as funny as it is the 1989 cult comedy Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong>. Before you go running for the exits, let me assure you it\u2019s all in good silly fun. Aside from the unsavory-sounding premise, this isn\u2019t one of those flicks where blood and body parts end up all over the place. I promise you that at no time does anybody attempt to play \u201cAutopsy\u201d with the body of the late Bernie Lomax (Kiser, Mannequin: On the Move).<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s surprisingly light-hearted for having such a dark premise, but that\u2019s part of the overall appeal of Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong>. I think this movie is a freaking riot! It starts out conventionally enough with a story involving Mob-backed insurance fraud, but quickly takes on a different tone after the titular character kicks the bucket.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s directed by Ted Kotcheff, the Canadian filmmaker most known for introducing the world to action hero John Rambo in the 1982 actioner First Blood. He also directed the disturbing Australian chiller Wake in Fright (1971). It might surprise you to know that Kotcheff is also responsible for comedies like the original Fun with Dick and Jane (1977), Switching Channels (1988) and Folks! (1992). I think that Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong> is his funniest movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0My buddy Ken and I didn\u2019t expect to laugh so hard when we caught the late afternoon show on opening day. I thought it would be yet another marginal midsummer comedy that would disappear from theaters after a week or two. I admit it when I\u2019m wrong and that was certainly the case with Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong>. It stuck around for a little while and deservedly so, it\u2019s hilarious!<\/p>\n

\u00a0Two low-level employees at an insurance company, the serious career-minded Richard (Silverman, Brighton Beach Memoirs) and more laid-back Larry (McCarthy, Mannequin), uncover evidence of insurance fraud and bring it to the attention of their boss Bernie. He commends them for being so conscientious and invites them to spend the weekend at his beach house in the Hamptons. Not so fast, this Bernie guy is a dishonest sleazebag. He\u2019s involved with the Mob and the invitation is just a pretext to lure the boys into a trap. Yep, it\u2019s going to be a good old-fashioned Mob hit! But wait, there\u2019s more.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The gangsters pull a double-cross and arrange for Bernie\u2019s murder instead. Not only is he a greedy little twerp, he\u2019s also sleeping with the boss\u2019 girlfriend. So it is that hitman Paulie (Calfa, The Return of the Living Dead) shows up at the beach house and kills Bernie. Richard and Larry arrive soon thereafter and discover their deceased boss sitting at his desk. At this point, they should call the police as any reasonable person would. Before they can do so, a whole bunch of people turn up for a party. It seems that Bernie\u2019s large house is kind of the area\u2019s Party Central. The funny thing is that none of the revelers seem to realize their host is no longer among the living.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s bad enough that the guys let the party proceed, but then Larry suggests that they put off notifying the police for fear of being implicated in Bernie\u2019s death. Sensible Richard opposes this, but he really doesn\u2019t have much of a choice, especially after his office crush Gwen (Stewart, Night of the Comet) arrives on the scene. Their recent date was a complete disaster and Richard really likes her a lot. She likely wouldn\u2019t approve of how they\u2019re handling the dead Bernie situation. In any event, it soon becomes a matter of self-preservation in maintaining the illusion that their boss is still alive, especially after the boys find out what\u2019s really going on. It doesn\u2019t help at all that Paulie keeps returning to \u201cfinish the job\u201d on Bernie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Now what do I mean when I say that Richard and Larry maintain the illusion of Bernie being alive and well?\u00a0 It means that Larry seats him in a beach chair and manipulates his movements by way of ropes and pulleys. It means that the guys tie their shoelaces to Bernie\u2019s\u2019 and walk him around the island. What else does this mean? It means that Bernie\u2019s corpse is subject to a great deal of abuse. It means that the guys keep losing him and finding him. It means that Paulie makes repeated attempts to kill the already-dead man. It means that Bernie ends up being dragged behind a speeding motorboat. For the audience, it means a laugh riot!<\/p>\n

\u00a0I doubt that Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong> will appeal to everybody. My wife didn\u2019t really care for it. It takes a warped and twisted sense of humor to appreciate something like Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong>. The whole notion of abusing a corpse is yucky and unpleasant; it\u2019s not funny in the traditional sense. This is why it\u2019s regarded as a cult movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0That being said, I think Kiser should have won a special Oscar for his performance as Bernie. How about \u201cBest Performance by an Actor Portraying a Corpse\u201d? It takes a great deal of talent and physical tolerance to do the things that he did in Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong>. I applaud Kiser for his efforts. Silverman and McCarthy make a pretty funny comedy duo in that their rapport comes off as completely natural. The pairing of uptight Richard and relaxed Larry reminds one of a certain other Odd Couple. Do the names Felix and Oscar ring a bell? Stewart is a very funny and very attractive lady and makes a nice addition to the cast. If there has to be a love interest (and there always does), why not somebody with both talent and looks?<\/p>\n

\u00a0I can see where normal folks would find Weekend at Bernie\u2019s<\/strong> distasteful, but thankfully I am anything but normal. I still get a real kick out of this movie. It\u2019s just great silly fun and I highly recommend it to those with a taste for the distasteful.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Weekend at Bernie\u2019s (1989)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 20th Century Fox\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 98 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (language, comic violence, sexual content, abuse of a corpse)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ted Kotcheff\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Robert Klane\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Andy Summers\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Francois Protat\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 5, 1989 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Andrew McCarthy, Jonathan Silverman, Catherine Mary Stewart, Terry Kiser, Don Calfa, Catherine Parks, Eloise Broady, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1834,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies","category-cool-cult-flicks"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Weekend-at-Bernies-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1521"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1521\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2054,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1521\/revisions\/2054"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}