History Literature / FriedGreenTomatoesAtTheWhistleStopCafe

* EverythingsWorseWithBees: Averted. Idgie can walk right up to a bee hive, jam her hand in it, and rip out a fist full of honeycombs without getting stung. As a CrowningMomentOfAwesome for the actress in the movie, their stunt double couldn't do the scene that day, so she decided to do it herself for real.

* FreudianExcuse: Novel Only: Why is Frank Bennet the scum of the Earth? Because he was the child of an [[AbusiveParents abusive father]] and walked in on his [[MommyIssues mother having an affair.]] Now he hates [[HeManWomanHater all women.]] Passionately.

* TheRedStapler: The Irondale Cafe, upon which the Whistle Stop Cafe was based, did not regularly serve fried green tomatoes before the movie (green tomatoes being a highly seasonal dish). After the movie came out, the influx of tourists caused the cafe to make fried green tomatoes a permanent addition to the menu.

* ThrowItIn: A lot of the scenes in the film were improvised, such as the drunken baseball game, or the food fight. In one instance Ninny's actress is trying to remember what her line is, before remembering it and going on. They decided to keep this in because it made for a convincing dramatic pause.

Administrivia/NeedsABetterDescription

''Fried Green Tomatoes'' tells the story of two friendships. The first, set in the modern day, is between Evelyn Couch, a dissatisfied, middle-age, menopausal housewife too frightened of death to commit suicide, and Ninny Threadgoode, a boisterous and talkative elderly woman who bolsters Evelyn's spirits with her storytelling. The story she tells is of another pair of women: {{Tomboy}} Idgie Threadgoode and SouthernBelle Ruth Jamison, who together ran a cafe in [[TheGreatDepression Depression-era]] [[TheDeepSouth Alabama]].

Fried Green Tomatoes tells the story of Idgie and Ruth as they live during the early 20th century in the south, as they face racism, sexism, and deal with homosexuality. All with a touch of humor thrown in between. Their story is told by an old woman named Ninny Threadgood, when visited in her retirement home by Evelyn, an unhappy woman in a troubled marriage who becomes inspired by Idgie and Ruth's spirit and learns from them how to be her own person.

* TheRedStapler: The author of the book found an old abandoned ghost town, and decided to write the book to make up a story behind the place. Then the movie came and they filmed it in the same ghost town, and ended up cleaning the place up a little. The film and book brought so much attention to it, that they opened up the actual whistle stop cafe there.

* FinallyFoundTheBody: Frank Bennet's truck is found in the river. [[spoiler: Years later, as the garden by the cafe is being dug up, so is his skull.]]

* FoodFight: The director left bowls of weapons on each side of the room for Idgie an Ruth to use in the scene, and told them to improvise. The insanity and laughter going on is real. He also said it was [[FreudWasRight supposed to be a metaphor for a sex scene.]]

** Except he actually isn't. Idgie mentions offhandedly that she recognizes the "big clodhoppers" she believes Grady wears. In a deleted scene, Grady reveals the truth-- his feet (and thus his shoes) are actually quite small, and thus he couldn't have been who Idgie saw in those robes.

NeedsABetterDescription

* AmbiguouslyGay: The movie decided to play Idgie and Ruth's relationship as a more subtle and heavily implied thing, rather than outright stating to the camera they were lovers, neither confirming nor denying.

* StrawFeminist: Various purposefully comical stereotypes show up in Evelyn's time, and after getting caught up in the story, Evelyn herself becomes an aggressive female-empowerment activist for a while before calming down. And she is awesome.

* AmbiguouslyGay: The movie decided to play Idgie and Ruth's relationship as a more subtle and heavily implied thing, rather than outright stating to the camera they were lovers.

* FryingPanOfDoom: [[spoiler: Sipsie]] clobbers Frank Bennet over the head with one to keep him from kidnapping his son. [[spoiler: Frank doesn't survive.]]

* PassFail: One of the novel's sub-plots is about a black character who is able to pass as white, only to cause trouble to a passing relative who recognized her without realizing she was trying to do so.

* ImagineSpot: done multiple times with Evelyn Couch.

* ParkingPayback: Evelyn rear-ends six times a car that stole her parking spot.

* BewareTheNiceOnes: What really happened to Frank Bennet? Did he just take off into the night? Drown himself? Or [[spoiler: did the sweet tiny eldery black woman he had knocked out moments before crack his head with a frying pan, then serve his roasted flesh as pork in the cafe?]] Or maybe he just went fishing.

** And the book has one of the most positive one in existence: Apparently no one knew that the judge at Frank Bennet's murder trial was [[spoiler: ''[[LaserGuidedKarma the father of one of his rape victims]]'']]
** The judge accepts evidence he ''knows'' is complete hooey to be admitted into trial. [[spoiler: The "evidence" exonerates a woman and a black man accused killing a white man. The judge has a special hatred for said white man, which is why he throws the murder charge out and rules the white man's disappearance as "death by misadventure".]]

* HumanResources: [[spoiler: Frank Bennett gets cut into steaks and served in the diner]]

* TheLadette: Idgie is rough and tomboyish and lives in the woods for a time.

* BrickJoke: Sipsey can't stand to see the heads of dead animals, so she buries them in the garden, which makes the vegetables grow big. Later, Dot Weems can't figure out how Sipsey grew butterbeans the size of silver dollars. [[spoiler: Sipsey also buries Frank Bennet's head here.]]

* BewareTheNiceOnes: What really happened to [[CompleteMonster Frank Bennet?]] Did he just take off into the night? Drown himself? Or [[spoiler: did the sweet tiny eldery black woman he had knocked out moments before crack his head with a frying pan, then serve his roasted flesh as pork in the cafe?]] Or maybe he just went fishing.

* TomboyAndGirlieGirl: Idgie and Ruth.

* TomboyAndGirlyGirl: Idgie and Ruth.

* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Eva Bates, again very much so.

* GoodBadGirl: Eva Bates, very much so.

!!This film/novel has examples of:

** The judge accepts evidence he ''knows'' is complete hooey to be admitted into trial. [[spoiler: The "evidence" exonorates a woman and a black man accused killing a white man. The judge has a special hatred for said white man, which is why he throws the murder charge out and rules the white man's disappearance as "death by misadventure".]]