Just how plausible is Weekend at Bernie's, the 1989 classic comedy featuring a dead guy and his two partying employees? Kyle Hill wrote an analysis of the movie from the perspective of a coroner.
Here's the Coroner Report of Weekend at Bernie's:
Lomax, Bernie
Date of death: June 5, 1989
Manner of death: heroin overdoseThe victim was discovered in his beach home with several gunshot wounds in his chest. The witnesses stated that they had been with the body for a period of at least 24 hours since the victim passed away from an apparent heroin overdose.
However, it is the opinion of this investigator that the witnesses’ testimony is faulty, based on the condition of the body. Their “weekend at Bernie’s” should have been “weekend with a bloated, stiff, green corpse.”
According to basic forensic science, the human body after death is not a pretty thing. After the induced heroin overdose, the victim would have quickly exhibited pallor mortis, or a loss of color in the skin due to the end of blood flow, within minutes of death. To pass off the victim at parties and in public, the witnesses must have taken time to apply and reapply extensive makeup to the body of the victim.
Read the rest over at Scientific American: Link