Shawshank Redeemed

Watched The Shawshank Redemption this evening. It remains in my estimation one of the greatest movies ever made – if for no other reason then because it’s a film that I can watch whatever my mood, and always get something out of it. The film manages – eventually – to be feel-good without restoring to romance or sentimentality, and puts you through an emotional grinder along the way. There seems to be a huge amount of plot and character crammed into it, and yet at the same time the pace is leisurely, never rushed. It never puts a foot wrong, and it seems a shame that none of its seven Oscar® nominations produced a statuette – Morgan Freeman in particular was robbed in my opinion. It does have popular acclaim, though – both IMDb’s Top 250 films and the top 100 movie list on Channel 4 a few months back had it in the number two spot, behind The Godfather and Star Wars respectively. Oh, and it serves as a reminder that Stephen King can write more than just trashy horror tomes…