Review

The Shawshank Redemption, the 1994 film by Frank Darabont is a stunning piece of American Cinema. From the story telling, the acting, camera work and the directing, the film gives the viewer a sense of realism. The film has one of the most memorable endings in movie history. The Shawshank Redemption is one of the best films of the 1990’s and has turned into one of the greatest films of all time.
The Shawshank Redemption tells the story of Andy Dufresne, a man sentence to serve two lifetimes in prison for the killing of his wife and her lover. The film opens with Andy sitting in his car outside of the man his wife is cheating on him with; he has a bottle of whiskey and a gun. The next scene is in the courtroom and Andy denies killing them, he swears he threw the gun in the river. He is found guilty and sentenced to Shawshank prison. Andy arrives at the prison and then we meet the other characters in the film, mainly a character by the name of Red. Red and the other inmates are watching the new arrivals at the prison, they take bets on which of the “fresh fish” will crack first. Red puts his pack of cigarettes on Andy.
Andy’s first night in prison a man who is only referred to as “Fat-Ass” is beaten and killed by Byron Hadley, a guard at the prison. A few weeks go by and Andy approaches Red so he can purchase a rock hammer. Red is a man who has connections and can get things into the prison for the inmates. Andy assures Red that he will not get caught with it. This is how the friendship of Andy and Red is first formed. Andy’s first year in the prison does not go so well. He is beaten and sexually assaulted by a man named Boggs. Boggs is eventually paralyzed by Hadley. Before going to prison, Andy was a banker, he does the guards tax returns, and he gets his own office in the library where he works at the prison. Warden Norton uses Andy to launder illicit money, by doing this Andy and his friends, especially Red get privileges that others do not get.
Andy turns a run down prison library into a library that would rival a high school’s. Here helps a young inmate named Tommy get his G.E.D. Tommy learns Andy’s story and tells Andy that he knows the man that actually killed his wife and her lover. Andy talks to Warden Norton about this and sends Andy to solitary confinement for two months, during this time the warden has Tommy shot. Andy is released back into the general population of the prison and he and Red have a conversation, Red is convinced that Andy is going to kill himself. The next morning, Andy does not come out of his cell, the guards check his cell and he is not there. He has escaped through a hole in the wall that he chiseled with his tiny rock hammer that Red had got for him years before. Mayhem ensues at the prison; Andy has taken out the warden’s laundered money, and exposed the prison for the crime that has gone down there. The warden kills himself as he is about to be arrested. Red is eventually given parole and meets up with Andy in Mexico.