Quite simply the greatest film ever made.

Rating: 10/10 (5 December 2004)

Frank Darabont's "The Shawshank Redemption", starring Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman, is the greatest film ever made in Hollywood. Plain and simple. The film tells the involving story of two prisoners at Shawshank Prison, and their decades together under the thumb of a cruel warden and his henchman. Andy (Tim Robbins, never better) is an innocent man, who uses his accounting skills to make himself useful to the warden, and struggles to keep up hope, against the counsel of his fellow inmates. Red (Morgan Freeman, astonishing) thinks hope is a dangerous thing, and is an institutionalized man, who can't imagine life outside of the prison walls. The film also stars Bob Gunton, Clancy Brown, William Sadler, and, in a powerful performance, James Whitmore. I'll say no more, because this film must be seen to be understood.