Fried Green Tomatoes centers on Evelyn Couch, who is a timid, and miserable housewife in her forties. Evelyn's husband Ed has an aunt in a nursing home in Anderson, Alabama that the couple go to visit on holidays. The aunt hates Evelyn, and isn't shy in showing so Evelyn finds herself hanging around the common area, which is where she meets Ninny Threadgoode. Ninny moved into the nursing home when her dear friend, Miss Otis needed to have more structured supervision, and now Ninny is just kind of biding her time until Miss Otis takes the deep sleep so that Ninny can finally go home. It's in this context that Ninny sees Evelyn sitting alone, and lonely in the common area, and strikes up a conversation. It's all fun and games at first, but then Ninny starts to talk about murder, and at that point, Evelyn is hooked. It's this frame story, and this relationship between Evelyn and Ninny that serves as the backbone of the film. Evelyn starts visiting Ninny more often, weekly in a lot of cases in order to hear more of the story behind Ninny's home town, Whistle Stop.
The framed story is a period story set just after the end of World War I, and it primarily revolves around Ninny's sister-in-law Idgie Threadgoode. Idgie is a tomboy, and an ornery one at that, but she's got a soft spot in her heart for her charming older brother Buddy who is the focus of infatuation for pretty much every young girl in town. The period story starts off when an older Threadgoode sibling gets married. Idgie threatens to ruin the whole affair, Buddy defuses the situation, and in the process, we're introduced to Ruth Jamison, Buddy's girlfriend. It's all pretty charming until Ruth's hat gets blown onto some train tracks. Buddy goes to retrieve it and decides to do some showboating in the process. However, his boot becomes stuck as a train is barreling down the tracks towards him, and the worst happens. Buddy dies, and Idgie removes herself from civilized culture pretty much completely.
Years pass, and Idgie falls in with the riffraff of the town. She's always boozing, and gambling and making a ruckus, and her mother has run out of ideas on how to draw Idgie back into civilized society. Enter Ruth, who Idgie's mother invites down for a summer to try and befriend Idgie. I suppose the reasoning is that since Ruth was also close to Buddy, Ruth might better understand how Idgie is feeling and maybe that could help Idgie towards a breakthrough. Ruth finds Idgie at the local watering hole, and attempts the tough love approach. Unfortunately, Idgie is super stubborn, and after a verbal altercation that saw Idgie actually in a car ready to leave, Idgie cuts and runs. After failed attempt number one, Ruth takes a different approach. She decides to get to know Idgie on Idgie's terms. To that end, Ruth learns to play poker, tries drinking, plays baseball, and accompanies Idgie on a relief run wherein Idgie hops a freight train and tosses food to the needy living in vagrant camps. It may not have been 100% morally ethical, but Ruth recognizes traits in Idgie that can be worked with.
Over the course of some time, the two women form a deep bond, like sisters. However, all good things and whatnot... Ruth meets a man by the name of Frank Bennett. For those wondering, Frank is in fact the man that was murdered, but we'll get to that. Frank and Ruth marry, and the two move back to his place in Valdosta, Georgia. Idgie misses the wedding, but shows up a time later to catch up. During the visit, Ruth is sullen, and squirrely. With some pressing, Idgie finds out that Frank has been abusing Ruth, and what's more, Ruth is pregnant. Spurned by a love for her friend, Idgie grabs her trusted right hand man, Big George, and another volunteer, and the three return to remove Ruth from her abusive situation. Frank shows up and there are a few tense words exchanged, but Frank, ever the coward, sees the writing on the wall. He still gets his final word though, as he pushes Ruth down the stairs on her way out of the house.
Once Ruth is settled back in Whistle Stop, she and Idgie decide to open a cafe. They naturally call it the Whistle Stop Cafe, and their specialty is fried green tomatoes served fresh all day, and barbecue, which Big George makes exceptionally well. Ruth raises her son, named Buddy Jr after Buddy Threadgoode, by way of community upbringing, which seems kind of weird by today's standard, but from a narrative point-of-view, it really helps to show how closely bonded everyone in this town really was, and how much they were able to reliably depend upon one another. Things are looking good until Frank Bennett shows up one evening to harass the people of Whistle Stop, opting to bring his buddies from the KKK. They whip Big George, but all of that is a distraction so that Frank can sneak a peak of his son. His intention was to kidnap the child, but he's found and aborts this attempt. Everyone is shaken up, but Idgie promises that if Frank ever shows up again, she'll do whatever is necessary to protect Ruth and Buddy.
In the meantime, our frame story between Evelyn and Ninny takes some twists and turns as well. Evelyn sees her marriage eroding and starts taking classes to try and get ahead of the mess. She starts trying to serve Ed more, and be more present in his daily routines at home, but Ed is a dense early 90s man's man who just doesn't get it. He's so absorbed in his football, and baseball, and challenge of the gladiators to notice how unhappy Evelyn has become. She even contemplates serving him dinner wrapped in nothing but cellophane. Evelyn starts menopause, and not knowing, becomes a hormonal basket case. At Ninny's behest, Evelyn gets on some hormone replacement pills, and gets a job with Mary Kay. The new found independence, and hormone replacement sees Evelyn begin to come into her own as an individual. She gains confidence in herself, and starts to stand up for herself more. The ensuing shenanigans are hilarious! Over the course of months, Evelyn, who has seen what's actually left of Whistle Stop, petitions Ed to led Ninny move in with them. Ed resists, but thinks the better of it because Evelyn is holding a hammer.
Back in the period part of the story, Frank Bennett has made another attempt to kidnap Buddy Jr, but at the last minute, he was thwarted by an unseen assailant. This leads to an investigation on the part of one Curtis Smoot, who just can't shut up about how good the barbecue is. The investigation seems to stall as no body is ever recovered, and even Frank's truck has never surfaced, but Smoot is persistent, and during some particularly heavy rainfall, Frank's truck literally surfaces in the local river. Immediately, Idgie is a prime suspect as she had publicly threatened Bennett, and so she and Big George are taken into custody, and transferred to Valdosta to await trial. The trial is goes nowhere really as Smoot still couldn't produce a body, and back in these days, the general rule of thumb was that there could be no murder without a body. The linchpin against the case is Reverend Scroggins, the reverend in Whistle Stop, getting on the stand and testifying under oath that Idgie and Big George were at his church revival the night of the murder. This gets both Idgie and Big George off for the murder, and that's that. Of course, the reverend lied, but he swore his oath on a copy of Moby Dick, and Ruth may have insinuated that in gratitude, Idgie might be persuaded to start attending church.
Years pass and everyone forgets about Frank Bennett. Buddy Jr is around 8 or 9 years old, and in keeping with the cyclical nature of time, there's a tragedy involving a train. Buddy Jr is hit, but only ends up losing an arm. Shortly thereafter, Ruth is diagnosed with terminal cancer. She'd been sick for a while, but asymptomatic. Throughout her decline, Idgie is there to keep her company, and to encourage her to fight her illness. Idgie also takes on a more direct motherly role in Buddy Jr's life as Ruth becomes to ill to even get out of bed. Eventually, Ruth passes away, and with her, so does one of the integral sparks that held Whistle Stop together. Things don't change over night, but slowly, people begin to drift away, and once the train station is closed, the town goes more or less completely under without any means of continued commercial support. It all seems pretty sad, but we know that Ninny and Miss Otis were still living there before they moved to the nursing home so there must have still been some life there for quite some time afterwards.
It's at this point that the frame story and the framed story begin to more closely intersect with one another. Evelyn arrives at the home one day, and Ninny is gone. Distraught, Evelyn tries to find out what happened, and she's initially led to believe that Ninny died. Really, it was Miss Otis who died. Ninny hopped a cab shortly before Evelyn arrived in order to go home. Realizing that Ninny would find the remnants of a ghost town, Evelyn rushes to the town. She finds Ninny sitting in front of what used to be her house. Ninny mourns the loss of her lifelong home as Evelyn suggests that Ninny move in with she and Ed. Once all of that's settled, Evelyn begs Ninny to reveal the identity of the real killer. Ninny recounts a lot of what we saw before, but peppers in details that we missed. For those who wish to avoid 27 year old spoilers, I suggest that you stop reading now! We were led to believe that a vagabond named Smokey Lonesome killed Frank Bennett, and that Idgie covered for him, but in actuality, it was Big George's wife Sipsey. She was soft spoken, but feisty, and always called things how she saw them. We then see Idgie, George, and Sipsey in George's house discussing how they'll never get Sipsey off on the murder of prominent white man. It's at that point that Idgie proclaims that it's time to make some barbecue. Now, the editing and implications here are not for the faint of heart as they insinuate that Big George barbecued the body of Frank Bennett, and Curtis Smoot at it all. It's a shock twist that should make M. Night Shyamalan blush in extreme embarrassment. But it's the kind of twist ending that you would never expect to come out of a 'chick flick'.
The final bit of insinuation is that Idgie is still alive charming bees, and raising Cain. There's even a fresh jar of honey on Ruth's grave to further support the theory. At that point the camera pulls out and we roll credits. I personally have always wondered if Ninny wasn't Idgie, but there's a lot of evidence to contrary. However, there's just enough evidence to support the theory that I keep it going just for fun.
Can I just say I love this movie! I love everything about this movie! I love the stories, I love the characters, I love the settings, I love the music, and I especially love the twist ending! There's very little to not love about this movie. The characters are dynamic, and well represented, even the side characters are extremely well developed, and interesting to watch on screen. All of the characters are so believable and relatable. The story is a slower burning story, but it's not boring to watch. The narrative does a great job connecting with the viewer on an emotional level, and that keeps you engaged. The idea of using parallel stories to frame the period stuff in a contemporary recounting was a genius idea because that gives us a perfect point-of-view character from which to approach the period stuff. Evelyn becomes an analog for the audience, and we only get to learn what happened back in the day as she does. So her enthusiasm towards the story that Ninny is telling helps us to be enthusiastic about it as well.
The acting in this film is really top notch. Every actor puts in their level best performance whether they were a main or they had one line. I like the way that shots are framed in this film too because the terrain isn't terribly dissimilar to that of the terrain where I grew up, and seeing vistas that remind me of home front and center in beautifully composed shots always makes me a bit wistful for my youth, but in a good way. The score that Thomas Newman did for this film is beyond amazing! It punctuates and highlights the story so perfectly that you'd almost think that Newman also helped to write the script. This is a fantastic movie, and I could praise it all day! I know it's regarded well because it cost $11 million to make, and it made $119 million in the box offices! I wish Hollywood would get their collective heads out of their butts, and go back to making great films like this on budgets that allow for more creative flexibility. But until then, we have movies like this on various digital media sources to enjoy over and over, and I highly recommend that you enjoy this one when you get a chance! And stick around for next week to see what we put under the microscope next!
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