An overrated and less believable take-off of Cool Hand Luke

Rating: 5/10 (8 August 2006)

This is supposed to be better than every movie but The Godfather? Well, maybe I could think more positively about it without such ridiculous comparisons, but this is an average movie at best. I guess my biggest problem with it is that it is so completely far-fetched. You have a few characters supplied solely to provide the "sad" moments, and everything else is just built up to provide a fulfilling and completely happy ending. Now I'm no prison warden, but I would look behind my tenant's posters (more in case they've tunneled into each other's rooms for a little lights-out action).
Anyway, as I thought about it more, the movie started to remind me of another classic prison flick, Cool Hand Luke. Unfortunately for Shawshank, Tim Robbins is no Paul Newman, and whatever stiff played the warden is no Struther Martin. Perhaps more importantly, though, is the way in which Cool Hand Luke presents a much more believable series of events, with no fairy tale ending. Luke's omission of the whole prison-love thing is even forgivable thanks to the inclusion of a classic car wash scene. One does not need a prisoner who happened to be roommates with a prisoner who happened to kill the wife of a man who happens to be a prisoner to create drama. It's a truth Shawshank dearly needs to learn.