The Shawshank Redemption

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For the novella, see Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption.
The Shawshank Redemption

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Frank Darabont
Produced by Niki Marvin
Written by Novella:
Stephen King
Screenplay:
Frank Darabont
Narrated by Morgan Freeman
Starring Tim Robbins
Morgan Freeman
Bob Gunton
William Sadler
Clancy Brown
Gil Bellows
Music by Thomas Newman
Cinematography Roger Deakins
Editing by Richard Francis-Bruce
Distributed by Columbia Pictures (1994-1999)
Warner Bros. (1999-present)
Release date(s) September 23, 1994
Running time 142 min.
Country United States
Language English
Budget $25 million
Gross revenue $28,341,469
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 American drama film, written and directed by Frank Darabont, based on the Stephen King novella, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption. The film stars Tim Robbins as Andy Dufresne and Morgan Freeman as Ellis Boyd "Red" Redding.

The film portrays Andy spending nearly two decades in the cruelty of Shawshank State Prison, a fictional penitentiary in Maine, and his friendship with Red, a fellow inmate. This movie exemplifies the gap between box office success and popularity. Despite receiving lukewarm box office reception, The Shawshank Redemption received favorable reviews from critics and has enjoyed a remarkable life on cable television, home video, and DVD, and continues to be noticed by popular culture fourteen years after its initial release. It is frequently ranked amongst the greatest films of all time.

Contents

[edit] Plot

In 1947, a young banker named Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) is convicted of murdering his wife and her lover based on strong circumstantial evidence, and is sentenced to two consecutive life sentences (one for each victim) at the notorious Shawshank Prison in Maine. Days later, prison inmate Ellis Boyd "Red" Redding (Morgan Freeman) appears before the Shawshank Prison Parole Board, which rejects his parole after having spent twenty years of his life sentence. Red emerges into the prison yard in time to witness the arrival of new inmates, including Andy Dufresne. Following an ominous and intimidating introduction by the disciplinarian Warden Samuel Norton and sadistic Chief Prison Guard Captain Byron Hadley, Andy and the other new inmates are deloused and shuffled to their cells. One of the prisoners breaks down in his cell, whereupon Captain Hadley savagely beats him unconscious, inflicting fatal injuries.

Andy asks Red for a Rita Hayworth poster as the inmates watch Gilda
Andy asks Red for a Rita Hayworth poster as the inmates watch Gilda

Andy gradually becomes acquainted with Red's circle of friends, and specifically Red himself, who is known as a clever supplier of smuggling in contraband to his fellow inmates. After a month of adjusting to his new life, Andy approaches Red and orders from him a rock hammer, so as to pursue his hobby of rock collecting. A friendship soon develops, which Red acknowledges as unlikely as he believed the younger man to be "a really cold fish." Andy initially works in the prison laundry, where he is harassed and sought out to be raped by a group of sadistic inmates known as "The Sisters." He endures the abuse for nearly two years, but he never speaks a word about it. One day, while tarring the roof of Shawshank's license plate factory, Andy overhears Captain Hadley discussing the taxes on an inheritance he is set to receive. Andy's efforts to help him with this problem nearly get him thrown off the roof, but his knowledge of finance enables him to set up a tax shelter for Captain Hadley. The only payment he asks in return is 3 beers a piece for each of his co-workers.

During a film screening, Andy asks Red to get him a poster of Rita Hayworth for his cell. When Andy is once again accosted and severely beaten by The Sisters as he leaves the theater, the prison guards commit vigilante punishment against the Sisters' leader, Boggs. It becomes clear to all prisoners that the guards are now protecting Andy from mistreatment. After spending a week in "the Hole," Boggs is permanently hospitalized and transferred out of Shawshank by a brutal act of retribution by Hadley, and Andy is never again victimized by any of the inmates. When Andy's skills gain the attention of the warden, he is appointed to assist elderly trustee Brooks Hatlen in the prison library, his first instance of preferential treatment, and writes to the Maine Senate for funds to improve the library. Andy sets up a makeshift office to provide tax and financial services to a growing number of guards and his "clientele" grows to include the entire prison staff, guards from other prisons, and even Warden Norton himself.

After Andy has spent nearly ten years in Shawshank, he and Red find a distraught and hostile Brooks holding a knife to Heywood's throat. Brooks' parole has finally been granted and he, in prison since 1905, is so accustomed to life inside that he fears the real world. Outside the prison walls, Brooks encounters nothing but loneliness, isolation, and a dead-end job of bagging groceries. While he was a respected man within prison, he is merely (according to Red) "a used-up old con with arthritis in both hands" in the outside world. In addition, he is given no sympathy by society and is harassed by his supervisor. He writes a final letter to his friends back at Shawshank before hanging himself in his room at a halfway house.

Warden Samuel Norton capitalizes on Andy's skills and devises a program to put prison inmates to work for local construction projects. His real motive is to embezzle funds in order to profit from corruption within the system. Andy then hides the embezzled funds for Norton by creating a fraudulent identity. Not coincidentally, the Warden expands the prison library, and Andy is given the opportunity to help inmates obtain their high school diplomas.

In 1965, a young prisoner named Tommy Williams enters Shawshank on a "B&E" charge. Andy takes a liking to him, and soon Tommy is being educated to take his GED. After attempting to complete the exam (which he later passes), he learns of Andy's supposed crime from Red, but he has a shocking story to tell: one of his old roommates had gleefully described murdering two people who fit the description of Andy's wife and her lover. Andy hopes that he will be able to get a new trial with Tommy's help. Instead of contacting a lawyer to reopen his case, he goes to the warden with the story, which Norton tries to dissuade as Tommy having made up out of pity. Fearing exposure if Andy is set free, Norton sends Andy to solitary confinement and orders Hadley to kill Tommy. Norton makes it very clear that Andy will continue to receive protection from the guards only if he continues to help Norton embezzle funds.

Two months later, Andy is released from solitary confinement and returns to the main prison population a seemingly broken man. Out in the yard, he gives ominous instructions to Red, telling him that if he is ever released, he is to go to a specific spot in a certain hayfield to find something that has been buried there. Andy's friends are concerned that he may commit suicide like Brooks. The following morning, however, Andy is missing from his cell, in which only a poster of Raquel Welch, who has replaced Rita, stares at the Warden. In a fury over Andy's vanishing into thin air, the Warden punctures a hole in the poster, and discovers to his shock that the poster conceals the mouth of a long escape tunnel through the concrete wall. Warden Norton loses his composure and commits all of his resources to tracking the escapee down, but Andy is never found.

In a flashback sequence, it is revealed that Andy escaped the prison by tunneling through the walls with his rock hammer for nearly 19 years, slowly chipping away at the cement wall and using various pin-up posters to cover up his work. He completed his escape by crawling 500 yards through a sewage tunnel. After his escape, Andy assumes the fake identity he created earlier for the purpose of concealing the warden's embezzlements. Wearing Norton's clean suit and shoes, Andy withdraws the funds that he had deposited over the years for Norton. He also sends evidence of the scams to a local newspaper, exposing the crimes of the warden and the head guard. Hadley is arrested, reportedly "sobbing like a little girl" as he is taken away, and Norton commits suicide in his office.

Soon after, in 1967, Red is finally released on parole after serving 40 years at Shawshank. After trying to cope with life outside prison (and being given the same job and apartment Brooks had had years earlier), he recalls his promise to Andy shortly before Andy's escape. Red finds money and instructions hidden in the field, and eventually reunites with Andy in Zihuatanejo on the coast of Mexico.

[edit] Cast

[edit] Production

Darabont secured the film adaptation rights in 1987 from Stephen King after impressing the author with his short film adaptation of "The Woman in the Room" in 1983. This is one of the more famous Dollar Deals made by King with aspiring filmmakers. Darabont later directed The Green Mile, which was based on another work about a prison by Stephen King, and then followed that up with an adaptation of King's novella The Mist.

The Shawshank Redemption was filmed in and around the city of Mansfield, Ohio, located in north-central Ohio. The prison featured in the film is the old, abandoned Ohio State Reformatory immediately north of downtown Mansfield. The Reformatory buildings have been used in several other films, including Harry and Walter Go to New York, Air Force One and Tango and Cash. Most of the prison yard has now been demolished to make room for expansion of the adjacent Richland Correctional Institute, but the Reformatory's Gothic Administration Building remains standing and, due to its prominent use in films, has become a tourist attraction. The real warden of the Richland Correctional Institute had a cameo appearance in Shawshank as the prisoner seated directly behind Tommy on his bus ride to prison and several other staff members from the nearby Mansfield Correctional Institution have small roles.

Several exterior scenes were shot at the Malabar Farm State Park, in nearby Lucas, Ohio.[1] The sequence in which Andy is parked outside his home contemplating murdering his wife was filmed at the Pugh Cabin within the park. The sequences representing the village of Buxton and the field where Red finds Andy's hidden letter were filmed on private land located opposite the park entrance on Bromfield Road. The oak tree is clearly visible from the roadside. The adjacent rock wall, which was constructed specifically for the film, is located on the far side of the hill away from the roadside. The wall is still standing, although it has been somewhat eroded. Other scenes were shot in Ashland, Ohio, Butler, Ohio, Upper Sandusky, Ohio and Portland, Maine.

The photo of a young Red on his parole forms is that of Morgan Freeman's son, Alfonso. Alfonso is also seen in the yard when Andy's load of prisoners is first dropped off, shouting enthusiastically "Fresh Fish! Fresh Fish" whilst reeling in an imaginary line. Alfonso later played a parody of his father's character, Red, in a short spoof titled The Sharktank Redemption, available on the second disc of the 10th anniversary DVD.

The film ends with the prominent dedication "In Memory of Allen Greene". Darabont dedicated the film to his friend and agent, Allen Greene II, who died just before the completion of the film due to complications from AIDS.[2]

[edit] Interpretations

Roger Ebert suggests that the integrity of Andy Dufresne is an important theme in the story line,[3] especially in prison, where integrity is lacking. Andy is an individual of integrity (here referring to adherence to a code of morality) among a host of criminals, and guards, with little integrity.[4] Additionally, some critics have interpreted the film as a Christian parable due to its handling of hope, original sin, redemption, salvation, and faith in the afterlife. Some Christian reviewers have referred to it as a film "true to Christian principles."[5] In the director's commentary track on the tenth anniversary DVD, Darabont denies any intent to create such a parable, and calls such interpretations of the film "fantastic."

[edit] Critical reaction

  • In 1998 Shawshank was not listed in AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies, but nine years later (2007), it placed at the 72nd position on the revised list, outranking both Forrest Gump (76th) and Pulp Fiction (94th), the two most critically acclaimed movies from the year of Shawshank's release.
  • In 1999, film critic Roger Ebert listed Shawshank on his "Great Movies" list,[6] and in reader polls by the film magazine Empire, the film ranked fifth in 2004 and first in 2006 on the lists for greatest movie of all time.[7][8]
  • The Shawshank Redemption, as of June, 2008, currently holds the #2 spot on the IMDB Top 250. It ranks second only to The Godfather, and currently has the highest number of votes than any other movie on the site, with over 330,000 votes as of 29 May 2008.
  • In 2002, The Shawshank Redemption was voted the third greatest film ever made in Channel 4's 100 Greatest Film Poll.

[edit] Music

Main article: The Shawshank Redemption (soundtrack)

The score was composed by Thomas Newman, and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Score in 1994. Interestingly enough, the main theme ("End Titles" on the soundtrack album) is perhaps best known to modern audiences as the inspirational sounding music from many movie trailers dealing with inspirational, dramatic, or romantic films in much the same way that James Horner's driving music from the end of Aliens is used in many movie trailers for action films.

[edit] References to other works

  • When Andy receives the first response to his letters to the Maine Senate concerning the prison library, the shipment includes a record of The Marriage of Figaro. Defying Norton, Andy plays the duet "Sull'aria Che soave zeffiretto" over the prison loudspeakers for all the inmates and guards to hear (the marvelous duet recorded by Edith Mathis and Gundula Janowitz).
  • While sorting books in the library, Heywood asks Andy what to do with a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo. When Andy notes that the book is about a prison break, Red advises that they file it in the educational materials section.
  • While talking to Red about Randell Stevens, an imaginary man used to cover up money laundering, Andy mentions that Randell Stevens is a "...second cousin to Harvey the rabbit." Andy is referencing an imaginary six-foot rabbit from the 1945 play Harvey.
  • Andy's prison break is quite like that of Giacomo Casanova, as outlined in his memoirs History of My Life. When planning his escape from the Leads, Casanova had a pick which he kept in the back of a Bible, which Andy did with his rock hammer. Also, Casanova instructed a fellow prisoner to put pictures of saints up on the wall to cover up the hole he was making.
  • When Warden Norton hears the sirens coming for him and opens his safe, he finds Andy's Bible in place of the bribe book that Andy smuggled out upon his escape. On the inset of the cover, Andy had written "Dear Warden: You were right, salvation lay within", which the warden once said to Andy in referring to the Bible. The warden flips further into the book and finds the cut-out pages that housed Andy's rock-hammer, which allowed him to tunnel out and escape over the course of 19 years. The opposing page to the start of the rock-hammer's cut-out is the page that begins the Bible's section entitled Exodus (which in the Bible describes the departure of the Israelites from slavery to freedom), showing how Andy's Bible, in a physical, ironic, and literal sense, was Andy's path to salvation.

[edit] Impact

  • As reported in the New York Times, this movie was in news headlines on December 17, 2007, as two jail inmates escaped from a high-security unit of the Union County jail, New Jersey, in what news reporters described as "Shawshank-style escape". They used photos of bikini-clad women to hide their escape holes. Both were eventually caught. [9]

A subplot of the 2006 movie "Puff, Puff, Pass" involves the two main characters trying to find a television with cable so they can watch a weekend marathon of "The Shank". One doesn't remember Andy being sodomized in prison, while the other insists that it's a major plot point. Other parts of Shawshank Redemption are referenced throughout the film.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ The Shawshank Redemption (1994) – Filiming Locations. imdb.com. Retrieved on 2008-01-15.
  2. ^ The Shawshank Redemption (1994) – Trivia. imdb.com. Retrieved on 2007-12-26.
  3. ^ Roger Ebert (1994-09-23). Review: The Shawshank Redemption.
  4. ^ Joseph Kellard. "Get Busy Living, or Get Busy Dying: A Review of "The Shawshank Redemption"", Capitalism Magazine, July 17, 2000. 
  5. ^ Debra L. Lewis (1994). Review: The Shawshank Redemption. Retrieved on 2007-12-26.
  6. ^ Roger Ebert (1999-10-17). Great Movies: The Shawshank Redemption.
  7. ^ "The 100 Greatest Movies Of All Time", Empire, 2004-01-30, pp. 97. 
  8. ^ "The 201 Greatest Movies Of All Time", Empire, 2006-01-27, pp. 100-1. 
  9. ^ Fernanda Santos. "Inmates Chip Away Jail’s Walls and Leap From Roof to Freedom", New York Times, December 17, 2007. 

[edit] Further reading

[edit] External links

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