The Shawshank Redemption

What better place to start a review of the best films in the world than the highest rated ever film, The Shawshank Redemption. It is about a banker, Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins), who is wrongly convicted of a double murder and his life inside prison. I don't want to spend too much time explaining plots when IMDB and Wikipedia do it so much better, so I'll leave it at that.

I remember first watching the film when I was younger with my parents, I was probably about 12 at the time and they were always suggesting films that I would enjoy. The majority of the time they were very boring films with little action or interest to my 12 year old self, however, my dad seemed especially keen for me to watch this so I decided to watch it with them. At first I was wondering why they were encouraging me to watch a film with murders, suicide, police brutality and the other stuff that goes on in the film but started to really enjoy it, not the aforementioned though. It was kind of like a Disney story in the fact that it was a relatively simple story, just a man's journey through prison, with a moral about hope that shines through all the bad things that happen throughout the film.

Overall an extremely good film, well deserving of the top rated slot on the IMDB list. The film glues you to the screen just through the story alone, without having to resort to flashy animations and CGI to keep you watching. I would definitely recommend this for anyone who hasn't seen it, from teenagers onwards, this is a film you will be glad you spent time to watch and I'm sure you'll want others to experience it too.

Directed by Frank Darabont
Also starring Morgan Freeman, Bob Gunton, William Sadler