Big Fish/YMMV

• Alternative Character Interpretation: Don Price is incredibly possessive of Sandra, and he beats Edward to a pulp when Edward makes advances towards her. But...is he really such a Jerkass, or was he just terrified of dying alone after the Witch showed him that he would die young? In the end, is he an antagonistic Jerkass, or is he a tragic underdog who spent his whole life being overshadowed by Edward only to die at age 20 as a direct result of Edward stealing his fiancee?
  • And of course, since all we know about him is how he's portrayed in Edward's self-aggrandizing stories, we have no idea how he really was or how the affair played out in real life.
• Non Sequitur Scene: At one point, Will sees a large fish swimming in Edward's pool when he goes to clean it, but it quickly vanishes and he never sees it again. The incident is never mentioned after that. We never find out if the fish was really there (or if he just imagined it), how it wound up in the pool...or, for that matter, how a fish could survive in water laced with chlorine...
• Fridge Brilliance:
  • When Don sees his future death in the Witch's eye, it makes you wonder how it will affect him later. Even Edward admits that seeing your own death "could kinda screw you up", but this is never brought up. Then again... later, Don shows that he's so desperate to marry Sandra that he'll beat Edward to a pulp for intruding on her, even though Sandra obviously doesn't love him and leaves him for Edward at the drop of a hat. Why is that? Could it be that he knew he was going to die soon, and was terrified of dying alone? Tragically, Don's desperation to avoid this ends up leading to his death.
  • The story about Edward catching the catfish is the very first story that we hear, and it's treated as a sort of Establishing Character Moment for both Edward and Will. Edward keeps telling it up until Will's in his 30s, even whipping it out on Will's prom night and at his wedding, giving the impression that he's self-centered and oblivious to his son's coming of age. We see Will gradually getting more annoyed at the story as he gets older, eventually accusing his dad of being a pompous glory hound who hides behind elaborate fantasies because he can't face the real world. But then at the end, we find out that the catfish story is, in fact, one of the only stories that Edward completely made up--all of his other tall tales were just exaggerated retellings of things that actually happened to him. The story then takes on a completely different meaning when you realize that Edward romanticized the story of his son's birth to make up for not being there. He wasn't telling the story out of ego...he was telling his son how much he loved him in the only way that he knew how.
• Gary Stu: Edward in the tall tales can be seen as this. Edward in real life...not as much.
• Growing the Beard: This is the movie that proved that Tim Burton could appeal to a wide audience outside of his cult fanbase of gothic fantasy and Black Comedy fans.
• Heartwarming Moments: The entire film.
  • Young Sandra's reaction at seeing Edward return after being declared MIA
  • All of Edward stories (while exaggerated) are real. The only truly fabricated story was the one of the Catfish. If one thinks about it this shows Edward's deep love for his son. He completely fabricated a story to help make up for his absence at the birth of his son, the son he loves very much.
• Retroactive Recognition: Deep Roy, who plays a circus clown/attorney, would later go on to play the Oompa Loompas in Burton's remake of Charlie and The Chocolate Factory. All of them.
  • Miley Cyrus appears as one of young Edward's friends.
  • The movie was one of Marion Cotillard's rare English-language films before winning the Oscar in 2007.
• Tear Jerker: When Sandra joins Edwards in the bath, but starts to cry ("I don't think I'll ever dry out") comes to mind.
  • When Will gives Edward his "proper ending".