Ever since I first saw this film from a rental in blockbuster this has been one of the all-time greats for me. This is one of those masterpieces that is the gold standard for so much.
This is, for one thing, one of those adaptation that is better than the book. Most Stephen King adaptations suffer because so much of his gift is both his prose and the denseness of his material. Only a handful of films in my lifetime have truly encapsulated the essence of King: The Dead Zone and Misery are still the gold standard for his horror films and this movie and Stand By Me are the standards for his more mainstream fiction. (I have the same problem with Kubrick's The Shining that King does, so let's leave that out of the discussION) Darabont's adaptation is utterly faithful to King's both in what it leaves in and what it chooses to omit. He somehow manages to make a less than hundred page novel not only last more than two and half hours but there isn't an inch of padding. And this may be one of the few movie adaptations of anybody book where all of the change he makes actually IMPROVE the gaps and problems in the original work. (This is clearest in not just Andy escape but how he manages revenge on all those that wronged him, which to be clear doesn't happen at all in the book.)
Trying to pick out a favorie section in the movie is almost impossible but I know that if I run across it on TV late in the film, I will always watch the sequence of Andy's escape. The moment where he takes off his shirt and stands in the rain in a moment of prayer and exultation is, in my opinion, one of the great moments in film history.
When Roger Ebert wrote his first book of Great Movies The Shawshank Redemption. And his main reason was that imdb.com ranked it number 1 among voters as the greatest movie of all time. 22 years after he wrote that book, that has not changed. Now I know that imdb.com is not the be-all and end-all metric of what makes the greatest films of all time. But what it tells me is that this film emotionally resonates with many viewers in a way that only the greatest films can. And considering that this a movie set in a prison and doesn't flinch from the brutality and darkness of every aspect of its life - and just as much how much it can break a person - that it comes across as not only joyous and life-affirming - almost spiritual - is a triumph of all concerned.
To be fair Freeman and Robbins have given better performances in their careers and in the case of Freeman more iconic ones. And I'd be willing to say that of more than a few of the supporting actors in the film - Clancy Brown, William Sadler and Bob Gunton are among the most gifted character actors in history. They all give extraordinary performance but I've seen them give great ones in work after this film. (And in the case of the two leads, before) But this film is majestic in a way and finds a way to soar even though its almost entirely claustrophobic. There were many classic films in 1994 (fOREST gUMP wasn't one, of course) but I don't think there's one that's more beloved. Certainly not by me and doubtless millions of others.