The ShawShank Redemption
Hello, everyone, my topic today is “The ShawShank Redemption”. Prison as a special place for prisoners is part of the society. It’s special because of its depriving the freedom of the prisoners. The prisoners in that situation are more sensitive to freedom than people in other situations. When they lost it, they found that it was so necessary to them that they looked forward to regaining it. By contrast, the people lived in the political society were interested in courting the fame and gain. They lost most of their inherent character. They put their soul into the fence of their own. They gave up the freedom of thinking. They forgot their original dream. The demands of the spirit were materialized to a position or some numbers.
A prisoner spent almost all the life in the prison. When he got the parole, which was applied for many years but without reply, he didn’t feel happy, but sad. He wanted to go to the prison again. He wanted to live in the place he knew. In the prison, he was a key who had knowledge and position. But when he went out of the prison, he found he was only an old man without anything. He couldn’t finish his work quickly because his hands had suffered the arthritis. Unfortunately, he even had no power to struggle. As a result, He chose to suicide because it was the only thing he could do by himself.
Red was a superman in the prison. He could find things that weren’t in the prison at all. But when he went out of the prison, he could do nothing. He lived in the fear and felt so lonely. He loved freedom but he couldn’t realize his value. In this film, Red said, “Hope is a dangerous thing. Drive a man insane. Nothing will take place here. You’d better get used to the idea. These walls here are kinds of funny. At the beginning, you hate them, then you will get used to them. As time passes, you will depend on them. That's institutionalizing.”
In this film, Andy as the symbol of the hope lived in the prison for 20 years. He remained his dream all the time. On one hand, he looked forward to getting freedom. On the other hand, he believed that he was innocent of the murder. The real reason was his profound thought about hope. In his opinion, hope is a good thing, maybe the best thing, and no good things ever die. It makes a strong man save himself, and a great man save another one. According to this idea, the life in prison for 20 years did not made Andy give up the hope, but made him comprehend the meaning of the life. In fact, hope is a mood without ambition but it really exists.
The sky, the sea and the beach compose a romantic picture. When Andy and Red, two weather-beaten friends, saw each other again in the island, all hardship of 20 years made Andy tougher and their friendship get harder as the same.