In response to SpaniardInTheWorks (SPOILER)

Rating: 5/10 (6 August 2000)

Just came across your words, and I couldn't have said it better myself. What's really insulting to me is the film's Republican wet dream worldview. Basically the message here is that if you keep your mouth shut and don't question authority, you will become a great man (if you're a free-spirited hippie, you'll die an early death alone). Of course Gump is a "simpleton"; any complex opinions might likewise bring out similar thoughts in the audience, and we can't have that is a big shiny Hollywood movie. (Yeah, Gump tried to speak out in DC, but the microphone went screwy...silenced by THE MAN! :) ) And what's with the ending? Let's see, AIDS, death, marriage, another death - all in twenty minutes. Jeez, it's shameless.

NO WAY this is better than Shawshank! Morgan Freeman's performance both breaks my heart and fills me with hope (pretty much what Hanks tried and failed to do - and he won the friggin' Oscar). And Pulp Fiction changed audience's and Hollywood's perception of what a film can be, something that Gump didn't even attempt.
It sucks. IT SUCKS.
Still, always great to see Sally Field...