Great Movie!

Rating: 9/10 (16 January 2017)

I'm the 2436th person to review this movie. I first saw this movie on TV while at a girl's house I was dating. I came in at about 30 minutes into the movie but I was truly captivated by the movie and I never forgot it. More than 15 years later I saw it on DVD uncut and I liked it even more. Some things I'd forgotten about from the last time I had seen it. But one thing I will never forget is the brutality of that lead guard, played by Clancy Brown. This was a movie that wanted me to abolish maximum security prisons! The violence, the rape the intimidation the corruption! It didn't start with Attica (See My Review Of Against The Wall) but has been in existence since America's founding.
Tim Robbin's character had the worst luck of anyone in the world! He was at the crime scene but did not go into the room where his wife was cheating on him. He left bullets behind and then stupidly threw his gone into the river only to not have it be discovered. Had he kept his gun the ballistics would have proved that his gun was not the murder weapon. As it stands another killer did the murder and in essence got away with the crime. This led to Andy's (Robbin's Character) being convicted for a crime he did not commit.
I was amazed at the inner strength that Robbin's character Andy had. He was beaten, humiliated, raped and yet was able to still persevere without losing his mind. But that's what he had in abundance. He had a mind and he used it to outwit his enemies and friends too. In many ways his escape reminded me of the two fellows who escaped from prison a few months ago in New York. It was a tenacious desire to get one's freedom from the oppression of the Man! This is why I admired Tim Robbins and his character, Andy.
Redd was portrayed so well by Morgan Freeman that the story might just as well have been about him too. I'm glad that Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford were not cast in these roles. The film would have suffered I'm sure. But I will say this, the film might have done better at the box office had the title been different. Shawshank Redemption is not really a catchy title and may have turned women and some men off entirely to seeing the film. This is what at least one writer said. Despite this I give the film Four and a Half Stars. Leonard Maltin gave it Two and a Half out of Four Stars. I disagree with that but he may have been turned off by the length of the film.
The author Robert A. Berman in his fantastic book Fade In: The Screen writing Process said something interesting. He said that he had read an article about films with bad titles. He said that almost every badly titled film did poorly at the box office. "The Shawshank Redemption, which did okay in theatres, might have done more business with a better title. I passed on seeing The Shawshank Redemption in the theatres. The title just turned me off." He went on to say that he saw it on Pay-For-View and liked it while adding that a good title can make a difference in box office sales. I concur with this observation. The title of this movie is nothing to write home about. This may have explained its average showing at the box office. Despite this, don't hold back from seeing this fine film. It's a true gem!