No Shame Movie Review: Shawshank Redemption

You know how I normally write about light-hearted movies, where people fall in love or kids do adorable things? Yeah, not this week. This week’s movie is instead based on a Stephen King book about prisoners – Shawshank Redemption.

Shawshank Redemption tells the story of Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins), a man given two life sentences in prison for murdering his wife and her lover. Like practically everyone else in Shawshank, Andy says he’s innocent (unlike practically everyone else, though, he might not be lying). Red (Morgan Freeman) claims he’s the only guilty man there, having actually killed his wife. Red and Andy quickly hit it off. The film follows the next 20 years in Shawshank — the crooked deals, parole hearings, abusive guards, and more.

Now, I’m not normally a fan of voiceover. I tend to find it awkward and stilted and full of backstory I really don’t care about. The voiceover in Shawshank Redemption is different, though. Maybe that’s just because it’s Morgan Freeman talking, and if a man was ever able to pull off voiceover it’s Morgan Freeman (honestly, though, I’d watch a documentary about grass if he narrated it). But even more than that, the narration seamlessly ties together nearly 20 years of life in prison, as well as all the twists and turns and backstory that entails. Without voiceover, Shawshank Redemption would feel like a hodge-podge of events and jumps through time. With it, we have a touching and cohesive story.

The voiceover also aligns the movie firmly with Red’s point of view. We see the story through his eyes, as he remembers it. And that also means we don’t find anything out until Red finds it out. This allows the film to keep secrets, to leave out important actions and motivations of our main character, Andy. Without keeping Andy hidden from view, the ending would seem inevitable and anticlimactic. I’m not going to give away any spoilers here, but it most certainly does not seem inevitable and anticlimactic. I promise you that.

Now, don’t let that last sentence — and the fact that this is based off a Stephen King novel — scare you off. I hate scary as much as the next girl, and this isn’t scary. It certainly isn’t full of sunshine and daisies, but it trends more towards the sad and heart wrenching than scary.

Shawshank Redemption is a movie about a prison, its guards and inhabitants. It’s about the wrongfully accused. It’s about lifers who have forgotten what it’s like to live on the outside. It’s about guards who will do whatever it takes to get ahead. This is a movie about issues that are far too real and scary, and that I am in no way qualified to actually talk about. More than half of my knowledge about problems with prisons comes from this movie, and no matter what my high school English teacher says, fictional movies do not count as nonfiction sources.  

Shawshank Redemption isn’t a movie I ever thought I’d like. It’s about boys and prisons and no one falls madly in love, not even once. But I surprised myself, and now I’ve seen it three times and listened to the book on tape.

So here’s what I want you to get out of this review. Don’t get stuck in the kinds of movies you like. Don’t just say, “I like romances” or “I like thriller/horror/zombie/action.” Try something different. Who knows, you just might surprise yourself.

Image credits: moviepostershop.com; thedailybeast.com; freeoz.org; johnlinkmovies.com

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