Hello everyone, today I will take you to interpret a film history classic, Shawshank's redemption.
This movie, presumably everyone is not strangers, Douban score 9.7, long-term domination of various movie list list, has not yet seen the small partner, I strongly recommend that you watch this movie.
The film is largely about the innocent owner, Gong Andi, who is accused of shooting and killing his wife and her lover, and is imprisoned for it.
In prison, Andy relied on his indomitable soul to resist the tilt of power relations in prison, and spent nearly two decades with a spoon-sized pickaxe to finally dig through the prison walls and run to freedom.
In this article, I try to decipher the theme that this film wants to discuss, and what kind of contradictions in the creators' thinking are reflected in it.
The movie is called "The Shawshank Redemption", so what exactly did the protagonist redeem, and where did he redeem it?
Without selling guanzi, this film mainly speaks of redemption in three senses: redeeming freedom from power relations, redeeming the innocence of the soul from sin, and redeeming the reality of life from nothingness.
These three redemptions are not discussed as separate subjects; they are like three threads twisted into a rope, intertwined with each other, each of which needs to be fulfilled on the basis of the other two.
Next I will interpret these three redemptions separately, then explain why these three redemptions are intertwined and inseparable, and finally I will try to discuss what kind of contradictions exist in the creator's mind.
1. Freedom
The first is the theme of freedom.
Some people say that the theme of this movie is freedom, and some people say that the theme of this movie is hope, but in fact, the ability to be free and the ability to maintain hope are the same thing.
To always have hope is to never see oneself as a poor creature imprisoned by the established treatment, but to demand a breakthrough from the established situation and to pursue a more ideal realm.
And that's freedom, freedom and hope are the same thing.
The so-called freedom, that is, always have hope, always pursue what you want, and the so-called hope, that is, always see yourself as free, and refuse to let your life degenerate into an animalistic existence completely limited by the external environment.
Of the two, freedom is the essence and hope is the manifestation.
Man is free, which is manifested in the fact that he can face a definite world but has hope, and this hope is a declaration that man can not accept the arrangement of this world for him, but have new and better ideals.
The opposite of freedom is precisely the power relationship that wants to keep people in an inhuman state, so the first meaning of salvation is to redeem freedom from the power relationship.
The portrayal of power relations in the film is the most explicit.
The warden will make a speech to the new prisoners, telling them, "Trust in God, and leave the rest to me." ”
This phrase is derived from a famous phrase in Western civilization, "God's to God, Caesar's to Caesar." ”
God represents spiritual faith, while Caesar represents earthly power.
The warden replaces Caesar with himself here, on the one hand, to show that he is the king of this prison, the embodiment of power relations, and at the same time, that this small prison is the embodiment of the whole world, and what happens here is repeated throughout the world.
The whole human world operates in a power relationship, but the outside world will add a lot of embellishments to the surface of this power relationship, unlike inside Shawshank Prison, which is manifested in such a naked form.
The relationship of power is the relationship of domination and domination, and the dominated are driven away like livestock and live a non-human life, and the non-human here does not mean that their material conditions are poor, but that this life is a life that does not correspond to human nature.
In this kind of life, man is domesticated by power, just as Zhuangzi said, he is dismembered in the soul, and he is dismembered in the soul.
The film also shows the process of power domestication of people, first of all, coercion, that is, forced to submit through force and intimidation, and the first night of Andy's imprisonment occurred when the guard chief killed the prisoner, which greatly shocked Andy's soul and had a very profound impact on him.
On the other hand, this incident sets the tone for the whole prison life, an environment in which one is constantly hurt and unable to resist.
This kind of force and intimidation is the foundation of power relations, it makes people dare not resist, and on this basis, it is also a way to induce.
People in Shawshank, by pandering to power relations and colluding with power relations, can give themselves preferential treatment, such as when you are bullied by villains, they can protect you, can improve your living conditions, can give you easier jobs, and so on.
Through coercion and inducement, power relations have successfully organized themselves into a system in which every prisoner is a member, and they both accept the oppression of the system and at the same time support the system, inseparable from the system.
Finally, the external dominating relationship becomes the inner spiritual order, and the soul is finally irreparably destroyed.
Therefore, the so-called redemption is to break free from this power relationship and live again as a free man.
Moreover, it is necessary not only to break free from external tangible power relations, but also from inner authority.
So, how do you get salvation from this relationship?
In fact, the protagonist Andy has made a lot of efforts, not only to escape from prison.
Andy tried to use his talents to gain a superior position in the power relationship so that he could make a difference.
He did, and he earned beer for his fellow inmates and made them live like free men in that moment, or rather, like real people.
He expanded the library for the prison, and he risked being punished for playing music for the people in the prison.
All of these practices are rebellion, power relations want to dehumanize people, and he wants to earn a little human dignity back.
But he soon understood that all this was in vain, and that power could be taken back from you.
They can protect you from villains, they can throw you back into the villains' pile, they can allow you to expand your library, and they can burn books with a torch.
Trying to play tricks within power relations and create some hope to come out is just an illusion.
Therefore, there is only one way to salvation, that is, to break away from this relationship and truly be an independent free person.
And that's the path Andy chose in the end.
Second, innocence
The second theme of the film is about redeeming one's innocent soul from sin.
All people are guilty, which is a very Christian statement and an idea implied by the film.
Taking off the cloak of religion, we can say that this doctrine of original sin expresses a profound experience that the human soul is imperfect and flawed.
There are some ugly thoughts in everyone's heart, which do not constitute legal sins, but indicate the filth of the human soul.
People who have a bitter feeling of this kind of soul filth have this guilt, and this may be the source of the original sin theory.
The ancient Chinese, on the other hand, saw that the human soul had a potential for goodness from the point that man could feel that his soul was not perfect, and strived for perfection, thus advocating the theory of sexual goodness.
Of course, this is all off-topic.
In the movie, the scene of the prisoner going to prison is symbolic, the naked body is washed clean, sprinkled with powder, and then locked up in the baby room, oh no, it is locked up in the cell, which is a parody of the birth of a human being.
This imitation also reinforces the notion that Shawshank Prison is the epitome of the entire human world, just as prisoners are imprisoned for sin, and people come into the world with sin, which is the Christian theory of original sin.
Therefore, the process of suffering in the world has the meaning of atonement, so that only three people who have actually left Shawshank Prison in the end have been washed away from their sins: Brooks, Red, and Andy.
Unfortunately, the first two redeemed their innocence in the face of sin, but did not redeem their freedom from the power relationship, and finally Brooks committed suicide, he has completely lost the ability to live as a person, and Red, inspired by Andy, began another journey of redemption.
It should be noted that in the context of the film, Andy is also guilty, and his crime lies in the failure to fulfill the responsibility of his husband and the killing heart, which of course has nothing to do with the law, which is the defect of his own soul that a person sees when he deeply reflects on his soul.
So how do you redeem your innocent soul from your sins?
The film responds through Red's two parole hearings that in order to clear himself of his sins, he needs to admit his sins and make bitter reflections.
Two hearings, the first time Red said that he was already a brand new person, parole did not pass, the second time he showed a deep pain for his young self, so the parole passed.
For only this pain is a sign of freedom from sin.
In the whole prison, including Andy, only Red believes that he is guilty, and in the end, Andy realizes his sin and repents bitterly, so that he realizes his salvation that night.
Third, existence
The third theme of the film is to redeem the reality of one's own life from nothingness.
The theme is more obscure, but there are many clues in the film.
On the first night of Andy's imprisonment, the captain of the guard killed a prisoner, and as I said above, it shook Andy's soul.
The next day at dinner, Andy asks what the prisoner's name is, but no one knows.
When this man comes into the world, he should not even have a name, and the road to salvation has not yet begun to die, what is the meaning of his life?
In fact, this is also a very important problem in Christianity, many children are born, even the baptism has not been carried out before the death, according to the Christian original sin, the child's soul is going to hell, but is this not too unreasonable, he has not yet started his own life.
Here is the first hint of this clue of the name.
The second time was Andy himself, and Andy didn't first buy a pickaxe to use to escape from prison, he only used it to carve and carve his name on the wall, and only in the process of engraving the name, a large stone was lit on the wall, which prompted him a way out of prison.
In fact, this is a very cleverly designed plot, a person's attempt to leave traces of his own existence, the real effort to pursue his own life, including a path of redemption.
This is the second time that the clue of the name has appeared.
The third time was Brooks, who carved "Brooks has come" on the beam he hanged. ”
Why names are so important is because this is the minimum existence of a person.
But this minimum existence is not the kind of reality that can enrich human life and make people's lives meaningful, which is what Andy is seeking.
But this kind of existence cannot be found in power relations, in which only power itself is real, all people are puppets of power, and people live a dominated inhuman life.
The true reality of life can only be realized when it is detached from the power relations and becomes a free man who shines with every feather.
So, either in power relations, let your life drift in vain in emptiness, or truly live as a person.
Be busy dying or busy living.
Andy chose the latter path.
These are the three themes that the film "The Shawshank Redemption" wants to express, and these three themes are closely linked, and the pursuit of freedom and the pursuit of innocence of the soul are inseparable.
Christianity recognizes man's free will, but on the other hand, according to original sin, man's free will always does sinful things under the influence of original sin, so free will is limited, so only by washing away the sin in the soul can the will be truly free to turn to good.
Therefore, Until he confesses his sins and repents bitterly, Andy cannot attain liberation.
And the innocent free soul is the condition for meaningful life.
In this way, the three themes are twisted into a rope and expressed together.
Finally, I try to analyze the contradictory attitudes in the author's thinking.
In expressing the first theme, the creator is extremely critical, portraying the destructive effect of Shawshank's system of power on human nature.
On the other hand, the influence of Christian thought hinders the sharp edge of this criticism, and Shawshank Prison is portrayed as an evil, but the entry of prisoners into Shawshank is caused by his own sin, and Shawshank is a necessary evil.
Necessary evil is also a concept in political science, and state organizations are often described as necessary evils.
Shawshank is the necessary evil, but in order for man to realize his freedom and realize the meaning of his existence, he must be freed from this necessary evil, which creates a contradiction.
So we see that the creator's description of Andy's final freedom is very ambiguous, and Andy's final place of stay is not too much ink, always hidden in a mysterious fog.
It seems to be an island overseas, a place that no one manages, a peach blossom source that is detached from human society, a dream utopia.
At this point, we understand how pessimistic the creators of this film, which is regarded as a passionate celebration of freedom and hope, have about achieving true freedom in the world.
Perhaps, it is this pessimism that inspires such a fervent celebration of freedom and hope.