The opening credits incorrectly list Alec's last name as "Guiness." It's "Guinness." [This is only in certain prints of the film. In other prints, his name is spelled correctly.] See more...
starring Alec Guinness, William Holden (add more)
Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. As such, any aggressive/abusive corrections (and I get quite a few) written as if they're comments I've made myself will be ignored. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click the edit icon under an entry, then choose "correct entry". Some entries have "duplicated entry" after them - these are entries which were already listed on the main page, but were submitted again. I occasionally leave these online for a while, just in case they were moved in error, so don't worry about pointing them out to me.
The commandos going to blow up the bridge are covered in black tar (or paint) when they are finished setting the charges. But in the morning they are almost clean. [You don't think they would make cleaning their night camouflage off their faces an urgent priority, to stop the Japanese guards identifying them? They have hours to wash their faces.]
In the final scene, when there was a skirmish between Alec Guinness, bridge demolition team and the Japanese soldiers, Guinness eventually falls on the detonator which blows up the bridge. But after that, all the Japanese soldiers just disappeared. Did that one guy with a mortar and a bunch of women take them all out? [There were not that many Japanese soldiers that left the bridge and we do see several bodies which is plausible given that the Japanese were in the open while the Brits were under cover. The other Japanese were killed in the bridge explosion.]
When the British POW's are marching into the Japanese camp whistling Colonel Bogey, as they march behind Alec Guinness, you can see one of the British soldiers swinging the same leg and arm at the same time. [While unusual, this is by no means unheard of. It's the curse of drill instructors everywhere.]
The bridge constructed by the British was in reality metal - and it's still there. [The story of the "The Bridge on the River Kwai" is not the story of building a single bridge. It is the story of WWII allied POWs forced under horrific conditions to build the Thai-Burma railroad for the Japanese Army. The railroad constructed was 415 Kilometers long and included 688 bridges, 680 of which where made of wood. For most of the railroads length it somewhat followed the route of the River Kwai and actually crossed it several times. When the railroad was completed, many of the bridges along its length where bombed and destroyed by allied air raids and had to be rebuilt. As such the wooden bridge in the movie is a composite representation of all the bridges.]
Near the end of the film, the demolition team plants the explosives at the base of the bridge supports, under the water. Yet, when Colonel Nicholson falls on the detonator, there are explosions on the bridge itself, far above where the charges were placed. [LISTEN to the movie. The charges were placed below the water line, but during the night the water level dropped. They are concerned that the charges are now visible.]
Corrected by Rlvlk
Alec Guinness gets a bloody nose after Colonel Saitu slaps him across the face with a flimsy Geneva conventions rule booklet. A paper cut would have been more realistic. [Although the book is flimsy, its spine would have been heavier due the pages being pressed together there and from the weight of the glue. Thus being hit in the nose with the spine could easily open a capillary in the nostril and cause the nosebleed.]
You may also like: A Bridge Too Far | Battle of the Bulge | The Great Escape | The Bridge at Remagen | Big Fish
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