The Shawshank Redemption

WOW! What a movie. At first, I was like, why is this the most highly rated movie ever? But after watching it, I know now. From the themes, to the characters, to the emotions they give, Peak fiction. I love how little details sprinkled throughout the movie about the themes of fear and hope pop up in all the characters. Brooks with his bird and what he does with freedom. Tommy hoping and fearing what grade he gets on his test and to him being the literal hope of redemption for Andy. Then the Warden, with no hope (even though he’s “Christian”) kills Tommy out of fear, because Tommy represents fear to him in the same way he represents hope to Andy. but he meets his untimely but deserved demise with a gunshot through the head, out of the same fear of what life behind bars could give him. The duality of the most Christian man being the most corrupt and dying because of the Bible verse that he hung up, that scene where it pans to the sign with the vault behind it was so good. I love how that came back to haunt him. Then there’s Red, who, like Brooks, gave up all hope and would have succumbed to fear. Looking back at it, I love how Red doesn’t get to leave the prison until they’ve assessed that he has truly lost all hope. The system doesn’t care that he’s rehabilitated or redeemed himself. It cares more about the fear they instilled onto him, that they “institutionalised” him. But Andy gave him that little hope that he had the whole time. The only gripe with the film that’s stopping it from a perfect score was going in the movie with false pretence. I really thought this movie was a Prison Break style film, but it really isn’t until the very end. It’s more of a thematic movie exploring prison life and how often hope goes in there to die. But other than that, it’s pure cinema. Maybe I’m just a sucker for happy endings, but when Andy and Red meet at the end, that right there healed me. And when the movie ends with that quote, it sealed the film for being Absolute Cinema: “Fear can hold you prisoner. Hope can set you free.”