The Shawshank Redemption is an extraordinary story about friendship, hope and survival inside a maximum security prison. The Shawshank Redemption is a crime thriller and this is shown by the voiceover by Red (Morgan Freeman), voiceovers are very typical of the thriller genre and usually mean that the story is taking place in the characters past. The use of flashbacks is also used in the opening scenes where the story flashes from Andy Dufresne’s (Tim Robbins) trial and the day where the murder took place. The fact that the story is based around a crime is also a convention of crime thrillers, the crime in this film is of a wrongly accussed accountant who is put on trial for the murder of his wife and her lover.
One of the main characters that we meet at the start of the film is Red. He is portrayed as the prison fixer, he is the go to guy, if you need something smuggled into the prison, then you go to him.
Another main character we are introduced to is Andy Dufresne. He is an accountant who is accussed of the murder of his wife and her lover and is given 2 life sentences back to back in Shawshank prison. He is portrayed as quite a weak character in the beginning but his strength shows through when he doesn’t make a sound during the first night.
The filming and editing techniques used in the start of this film are things like close up shots of the new prisoner, dramatic zooms on andy’s face when he is in the car with the gun.
The key lighting in the car when Andy is reloading his revolver the light is focused on his face the light looks very dark and shadowy this creates a scary and mysterious image of a man seeking his revenge.
R1-26 Thriller Opening 