* AdaptationDisplacement: The film is much better-known today than the novel.
* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Debate has raged since the film’s release whether [[spoiler:Nicholson deliberately fell on the detonator after his MyGodWhatHaveIDone moment]].
* AmericansHateTingle: Although a bestseller, the original novel received a fair amount of hostile response in the UK as an "anti-British" tract written by a Frenchman. This extended to some of the film's cast, namely both Creator/AlecGuinness and James Donald (which, according to Kevin Brownlow, influenced their performances). For his part, Pierre Boulle was indignant about these accusations, as he had great respect for the British he'd served with during the war and wrote other novels with a more positive view of the British military. He was at pains to explain that he based Nicholson on ''French'' officers he'd known in Indochina who collaborated with the Japanese, rather than Philip Toosey or other British [=POW=]s. The movie largely escaped this, since it was made by a British director with a mostly-British cast and crew, though it received some brickbats for its historical inaccuracies.
* AwardSnub: Sessue Hayakawa, the first Asian actor to become a movie star in Hollywood, missed out on his only chance to win an Oscar that recognised his achievements - losing out to musical comedy star Red Buttons [[TomHanksSyndrome in a dramatic turn]] for ''{{Film/Sayonara}}''. And since Creator/MiyoshiUmeki became the first Asian actor to win an Oscar that night for the same film, it could have been a double victory for them.
* FairForItsDay:
** One of the earliest UsefulNotes/WorldWarII films to depict Japanese characters with any degree of sympathy. Sessue Hayakawa was reportedly very proud of the film for humanizing the Japanese at a time when most Hollywood and British movies still reflected wartime YellowPeril propaganda. It also has actual Asian actors and actresses playing all the Asian characters in an era when white actors still donned the shoe polish to play minorities.
** Royce and one of the Thai lady porters are set up as possibly being romantically interested in one another. While it's not a major element of the story, it's remarkable that this is portrayed in a positive and light-hearted manner when interacial relationships were still frowned upon and illegal in the United States.
* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff: Oddly enough, the movie was popular in Japan during its original run, perhaps for the reason stated above.
* HomegrownHero: Shears (who is the only one to escape ''and'' return to destroy the titular bridge) happens to be the only American soldier in the otherwise British-dominated POW camp. Needless to say, he used to be British in the original book.
* JerkassWoobie: Shears. Yes, life in a prison camp ruled by a despot has hardened him and has made him contemptuous of by-the-book soldiers following orders like Nicholson and Warden, but he turned down a soldier who wanted to come with him and he's opportunist enough to try to worm his way out of any terrible situation however he can.
* ParodyDisplacement: Kenneth Alford's 1914 tune "Colonel Bogey March" is now best known as the theme tune for this movie. During UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, the song acquired parody lyrics and became known as "Hitler Has Only Got One Ball".
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