Still riveting after so many years

Rating: 10/10 (18 April 2008)

The Shawshank Redemption became one of my favorite movies years ago. As I watched it again on a whim just now, it so shook me anew that I just had to tell the world how I felt.
What I felt was the same kind of awe and irrepressible reverberation in my heart as when I listen to a Brahms symphony or when I see the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. This movie is art: it envelopes you, shatters you, and consumes you.
Speaking of Brahms, this movie maintains an almost Olympian pace similar to that of the composer's great works. It propels the story forward with engrossing tension but leaves room for reflections on hope, despair and redemption. The spot-on pacing, which derives from a serendipitously good combination of scripting, directing, acting and editing, gives the movie the feel of an epic.
It seems safe to declare that The Shawshank Redemption has achieved immortality, and that is its best redemption from its box office mediocrity 14 years ago.