A poignant story

Rating: 10/10 (11 May 2014)

It's a poignant story about hope. Hope gets me. That's what makes a film like this more than a movie. It tells a lesson about life. Those are the films people talk about 50 or even 100 years from you. It's also a story for freedom. Freedom from isolation, from rule, from bigotry and hate. Freeman and Robbins are majestic in their performances. Each learns from the other. Their relationship is strong and you feel that from the first moment they make contact with one another. There is also a wonderful performance from legend James Whitmore as Brooks.
Several exterior scenes were shot at the Malabar Farm State Park, in nearby Lucas, Ohio. The sequence in which Andy is parked outside his home contemplating murdering his wife was filmed at the Pugh Cabin within the park.
The Shawshank Redemption was filmed in and around the city of Mansfield, Ohio, located in north-central Ohio. The prison featured in the film is the old Ohio State Reformatory immediately north of down town Mansfield.
The sequences representing the village of Buxton and the field where Red finds Andy's hidden letter were filmed on private land located opposite the park entrance on Bromfield Road. The oak tree is clearly visible from the roadside. The adjacent rock wall, which was constructed specifically for the film, is located on the far side of the hill away from the roadside. The wall is still standing, although it has been somewhat eroded. Other scenes were shot in Ashland, Ohio, Butler, Ohio, Upper Sandusky, Ohio and Portland, Maine.
The two scenes in Mexico were filmed on the Island of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The first scene where Andy was driving a convertible on a road along the Pacific Coast with the top down is route 73 on the north side of St. Croix between Salt River (where Christopher Columbus landed in 1493) and Cane Bay.
The second scene was the last scene of the movie. Red was walking on a beach toward his friend Andy while he worked on repairs to a boat on the beach. That was filmed at Sandy Point National Wildlife Refuge on the south west point of St.Croix.