A blockbuster that exposes the shady American justice, a picture of life depicted by friendship and hope, and a world metaphorically represented by philosophy of life. The story is not so much about the hero Andy's successful escape from prison to regain his freedom as about the process of Andy and others being saved from soul to body. Seven nominations for the 67th Academy Awards, one of the top ten most powerful movies in Hollywood. The film broke through the limitation of prison films and made a rare human touch and warmth of similar works, so it became the highest-grossing dark horse as soon as it was released.
Synopsis The story happened in 1947. Andy, a banker, was accused of killing her and her lover with a gun because of his wife's extramarital affairs, and was sentenced to life imprisonment, which means he will spend the rest of his life in Shawshank prison.
Rhett 1927 was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder, and his parole failed several times. He has now become an authority figure in Shawshank prison. As long as you can afford it, he can almost get some "luxuries" from his cellmates: cigarettes, candy, wine and even marijuana. Whenever a new prisoner comes, everyone bets on who will cry on the first night. Rhett thinks Andy, who is fragile and bookish, will cry. As a result, Andy's silence made him lose two packs of cigarettes, but it also made Rhett sit up and take notice of him.
At first, Andy never contacted anyone. He walked leisurely in the yard, just like in the park. A month later, the first thing Andy asked Rhett to do for him was a stone hammer. His explanation was that he wanted to carve some small things to kill time, and he said that he managed to escape the routine inspection by the prison authorities himself. Soon, Rhett played the chess carved by Andy. Later, Andy made a huge poster of porn star hayworth's "breasts" and posted it on the wall of his cell.
Once, Andy and several other prisoners went out to work, and he overheard the prison officer talking about the headache of paying taxes. Andy said he had a way to get prison officials to legally exempt this large amount of tax. In exchange, he won three bottles of beer for each of a dozen prisoners' friends. Drinking beer, Rhett said that he felt free for the first time in many years.
Andy's mastery of financial knowledge soon freed him from the heavy physical labor in prison and the harassment of other abnormal prisoners. Soon, the famous Andy began to deal with tax issues for more and more prison guards, and even asked him about his children's further education. Meanwhile, Andy gradually became an important tool for Shawshank warden Norton to launder money.
Prison life is long and boring. Andy kept writing to the state legislature and finally applied for a small sum of money for the construction of the prison library. At the same time, in order to show the charm of music and let more people know about it, Andy risked being punished to play a shocking Italian opera and gave Rhett a harmonica.
The arrival of a young prisoner broke Andy's quiet prison life. The prisoner had heard about Andy's case when he was serving his sentence in another prison. He knew who the real murderer was! However, when Andy asked the warden to report the situation in order to try to reopen the case, he was rebuffed and severely punished by solitary confinement for one month. During the confinement, the warden came to visit Andy and advised him to stay in prison and "enjoy life". The warden flew into a rage when he learned that Andy was determined to find out the real murderer and get a new life. In order to prevent Andy from being released, the prison did not hesitate to design and kill the insider, and gave Andy a one-month confinement punishment!
Faced with the cruel reality, Andy became depressed and repeated his financial work day after day in prison ... One day, he suddenly said to Rhett, "If you can get parole one day, you must go somewhere to realize a wish for me." That's where I proposed to my wife. Dig out a box under a big oak tree there, which contains something I gave you. "That night, it was stormy and thunderous, and Andy successfully escaped from prison after 20 years in prison.
It turns out that Andy has been digging holes with that pebble hammer every day for 20 years, and then covering the holes with posters. At the same time, because he has a clever mind, the warden has been asking Andy to do black accounts and money laundering for him, and transfer the black money he earned and the cheap labor in the prison one by one. Andy put all the black money in the name of a man named Steven. In fact, this Steven is a fictional character of Andy. Andy made Steven all kinds of certificates, driver's license, ID card, and it was flawless. After Andy escaped from prison, he took part of the black money saved by the warden under Steven's pseudonym, lived a good life with this large sum of money, and told on the truth of the warden's corruption and bribery. The warden saw a Bible that Andy had left in the safe. He put this little ledger in it. The title page reads: "Warden, you are right, the road to redemption is among them." When he saw that the hollowed-out part was just enough to put down the pebble hammer, the warden realized that Andy had never given in. At this time, the police were coming to the prison to arrest the warden, and finally the warden shot himself.
Rhett was paroled. After he found a box of cash and a letter left by Andy under the oak tree, he decided to violate the parole and seek freedom, so he set off for Chihuatanio. Andy and Rhett, two old friends, finally meet again on a sunny beach in Mexico.