The Shawshank Redemption
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The Shawshank Redemption
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This film has been preserved in the National Film Registry in 2015.
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 The highest-rated film on IMDb!
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The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 prison drama directed by director Frank Darabont based on Stephen King's 1982 novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption. It was released on September 23, 1994. The movie also casts the famous Morgan Freeman as Ellis Boyd "Red" Redding.
Plot
Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) is sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison for the murders of his wife and her lover and is sentenced to a tough prison. However, only Andy knows he didn't commit the crimes. While there, he forms a friendship with Red (Morgan Freeman), experiences brutality of prison life, adapts, helps the warden, etc., all in 19 years.
Why Hope Should Set You Free
- The idea of the prisoners who didn't commit the crimes is very creative and original.
- Outstanding acting from Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman.
- Amazing cinematography.
- Beautiful score from Thomas Newman.
- The film has some of the most iconic scenes in cinema history. A great example is the part where Andy escapes the prison and kneels in happiness in the pouring rain.
- Morgan Freeman's narration is amazing and his dubbing is perfect.
- The characters are simply fantastic, all feeling very real.
- Warden Samuel Norton is a very intimidating and compelling villain.
- The story of Brooke is saddening and does an amazing job of showing a realistic depiction of someone going back into society after decades of being locked away and not being able to readjust to society.
- Andy's escape scene is very satisfying as he finally leaves the place that caused him so much pain and be free like he deserved.
- It's ending is very satisfying and emotional as it shows Andy finally free, the corrupted guards arrested, and Red freed from prison with him eventually meeting up with Andy doing exactly as he promised Red he'd do.
- It shows us a brutally honest depiction of prison life and humanizes prison inmates instead of the usual Hollywood "every inmate is a monster" cliché. In fact, this movie was criticized for portraying prison guards as using beatings to control inmates, but prison guards have been known to do exactly that in real life, and such things would have been even more widespread during the time the film takes place in.
- Excellent directing of Frank Darabont.
Qualities That Keep You Prisoner
- Major Plot Hole: How did Andy get the poster to cover the hole before he left. It's possible he hung the poster up by the two ends on the top, before lifting it up to leave, but it's never shown how he did.
- Elmo Blatch ultimately gets away with his crime of murdering Andy's wife and her lover because Andy doesn't even bother cleaning up his name after escaping. Granted, the film leaves it ambiguous whether Andy really killed his wife or if Blatch was just crazy and claimed responsibility for Andy's crime just to look scary, but still.
Reception
The Shawshank Redemption was universally acclaimed by critics and received overwhelmingly positive reviews from audiences. Contemporary review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a 91% approval rating from 77 critics, with an average rating of 8.30/10. The consensus reads, "The Shawshank Redemption is an uplifting, deeply satisfying prison drama with sensitive direction and fine performances.". The film also has a score of 81 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 20 critics indicating "universal acclaim". It got a 9.3/10 on IMDb and became the highest-rated film on IMDb's Top Rated Movies.The film was nominated for seven Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Actor for Morgan Freeman, Best Adapted Screenplay for Frank Darabont, Best Cinematography for Roger Deakins, Best Film Editing for Richard Francis-Bruce, and Best Screenplay for Darabont).
Videos
Trivia
- The film was based on Stephen King’s novella “Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption”.
- Red’s cell number is 237, a numerological reference to another Stephen King movie: Room 237 in The Shining’s Overlook Hotel.
- The scene where Andy plays opera music for the prison has been edited many times on YouTube. Said opera music has been replaced by various kinds of music, from pop music to heavy metal, and even by flea market ads. To be fair, the reactions of the prisoners and the warden made it pretty ripe for parody.
- Stephen King has said he never cashed the check he received for selling the rights to the film. King later framed the check and mailed it back to director Frank Darabont with a note saying, “In case you ever need bail money. Love, Steve.”
- Morgan Freeman’s role as Red was depicted in the original novella as Irish. His name is a reference to the color of the character’s hair.
- William Sadler would later appeared more than two Stephen King films, The Green Mile, The Mist and Salem's Lot.
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