The Shawshank Redemption Quotes – ‘Get busy living or get busy dying.’

Starring: Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, Bob Gunton, William Sadler, Clancy Brown, Gil Bellows, Mark Rolston, James Whitmore

OUR RATING: ★★★★★

Story:

Prison drama written and directed by Frank Darabont, based on a Stephen King novella. The story follows banker Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins), who is sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison for the murders of his wife and her lover in Shawshank State Penitentiary, despite his claims of innocence. Over the following decades, he forms a friendship with fellow prioner Red (Morgan Freeman), and becomes instrumental in a money laundering operation led by the prison warden Samuel Norton (Bob Gunton).

Our Favorite Quotes:

‘Some things are best left unsaid.’ – Red (The Shawshank Redemption) Click To Tweet ‘That's where I want to live the rest of my life. A warm place with no memory.’ - Andy Dufresne (The Shawshank Redemption) Click To Tweet ‘I guess it comes down to a simple choice really. Get busy living or get busy dying.’ - Andy Dufresne (The Shawshank Redemption) Click To Tweet ‘Alone in the dark with nothing but your thoughts, time can draw out like a blade.’ – Red (The Shawshank Redemption) Click To Tweet ‘Remember, Red, hope is a good thing. Maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.’ - Andy Dufresne (The Shawshank Redemption) Click To Tweet ‘I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope.’ – Red (The Shawshank Redemption) Click To Tweet

Best Quotes (Total Quotes: 145)

[first lines; Andy is sat in his car listening to the radio, he takes a gun from his glove compartment then takes a swig from his bottle; the scene moves to the courtroom where Andy is being prosecuted by the DA]
District Attorney: Mr. Dufresne, describe the confrontation you had with your wife the night that she was murdered.
Andy Dufresne: It was very bitter. She said she was glad I knew, that she hated all the sneaking around. And she said that she wanted a divorce in Reno.
District Attorney: What was your response?
Andy Dufresne: I told her I would not grant one.
District Attorney: “I’ll see you in hell before I see you in Reno.” Those were the words you used, Mr. Dufresne, according to the testimony of your neighbors.
Andy Dufresne: If they say so. I really don’t remember, I was upset.

District Attorney: What happened after you argued with your wife?
Andy Dufresne: She packed a bag. She packed a bag to go and stay with Mr. Quentin.
District Attorney: Glenn Quentin. A golf pro at the Snowdon Hills Country Club. The man you had recently discovered was your wife’s lover. Did you follow her?
Andy Dufresne: I went to a few bars first. Later, I drove to his house to confront them. They weren’t home, so I parked in the turnout, and waited.
District Attorney: With what intention?
Andy Dufresne: I’m not sure. I was confused, drunk. I think, mostly I wanted to scare them.
District Attorney: When they arrived, you went up to the house and murdered them.
Andy Dufresne: No, I was sobering up. I got back in the car and I drove home to sleep it off. Along the way, I stopped, and I threw my gun into the Royal River. I feel I’ve been very clear on this point.
District Attorney: Well, where I get hazy is where the cleaning woman shows up the following morning and finds your wife in bed with her lover, riddled with .38 caliber bullets. Now, does that strike you as a fantastic coincidence, Mr. Dufresne, or is it just me?
Andy Dufresne: Yes, it does.

District Attorney: Yet you still maintain that you threw your gun into the river before the murders took place? That’s very convenient.
Andy Dufresne: It’s the truth.
District Attorney: The police dragged that river for three days, and nary a gun was found. So, there could be no comparison made between your gun and the bullets taken from the bloodstained corpses of the victims. And that also is very convenient. Isn’t it, Mr. Dufresne?
Andy Dufresne: Since I am innocent of this crime, sir, I find it decidedly inconvenient that the gun was never found.

District Attorney: Ladies and gentlemen, you’ve heard all the evidence, you know all the facts. We have the accused at the scene of the crime. We have footprints, tire tracks, we have bullets strewn on the ground which bear his fingerprints. A broken bourbon bottle, likewise with fingerprints. And most of all, we have a beautiful young woman and her lover lying dead in each other’s arms. They had sinned. But was their crime so great as to merit a death sentence? Now, while you think about that, think about this.
[he holds up a gun]
District Attorney: A revolver holds six bullets, not eight. I submit that this was not a hot-blooded crime of passion. That at least could be understood, if not condoned. No. This was revenge of a much more brutal and cold-blooded nature. Consider this: Four bullets per victim. Not six shots fired, but eight. That means that he fired the gun empty, and then stopped to reload, so that he could shoot each of them again. An extra bullet per lover, right in the head.

Judge: You strike me as a particularly icy and remorseless man, Mr. Dufresne. It chills my blood just to look at you. By the power vested in me by the state of Maine, I hereby order you to serve two life sentences, back to back. One for each of your victims. So be it.
[Andy looks horrified]

[1947 Parole Hearings – Red enters the room]
1947 Parole Hearings Man: Sit.
[a nervous looking Red takes a seat]
1947 Parole Hearings Man: We see by your file you’ve served twenty years of a life sentence.
Red: Yes, sir.
1947 Parole Hearings Man: You feel you’ve been rehabilitated?
Red: Oh, yes, sir. Absolutely, sir. I mean, I learned my lesson. I can honestly say that I’m a changed man. I’m no longer a danger to society. That’s God’s honest truth.
[we see Red getting a “Rejection” stamp in his parole file]

[after the hearing Red goes to the prison yard]
Skeet: Hey, Red. How did it go?
Red: Same old shit. Different day.
Skeet: Yeah, I know how you feel. I’m up for rejection next week.
Jigger: Yeah, I got rejected last week.
Red: It happens.
Ernie: Hey, Red. Bump me a deck.
Red: Get the fuck out of my face, will you, man?
Ernie: Come on.
Red: You’ve been to me for five packs already!
Ernie: Four.
Red: Five!

Red: [narrating] There must be a con like me in every prison in America. I’m the guy who can get it for you. Cigarettes, a bag of reefer, if that’s your thing. A bottle of brandy to celebrate your kid’s high-school graduation. Damn near anything, within reason. Yes, sir. I’m a regular Sears and Roebuck.
[the siren blares in the prison yard]
Red: [narrating] So, when Andy Dufresne came to me in 1949 and asked me to smuggle Rita Hayworth into the prison for him, I told him, “No problem.”

[we see the new prisoners being driven to Shawshank Prison]
Red: [narrating] Andy came to Shawshank Prison in early 1947, for murdering his wife
and the fella she was banging. On the outside he’d been vice-president of a large Portland bank. Good work for a man as young as he was.
[the prisoners in the yard, including Red, go to get a better view of the new prisoners arriving]
Floyd: Hey, Red.

[to the new prisoner stepping off the bus]
Captain Hadley: Do you speak English, butt steak? You follow this officer.
[the new prisoners step off the bus and follow the prison officer, the prisoners in the yard are all cheering as they watch them]
Heywood: I haven’t seen such a sorry looking heap of maggot shit in all my life.
[to the new prisoners]
Fresh Fish Con #1: Hey, fish! Come over here.
[the new prisoners, including a nervous looking Andy follow Hadley into the prison as the other prisoners jeer and shout]
Fresh Fish Con #2: Come on, fish!

[as they watch the new prisoners]
Floyd: Taking bets today, Red?
Red: Smokes or coins? Betters choice.
Floyd: Smokes. Put me down for two.
Red: Alright. Who’s your horse?
Floyd: That little sack of shit. Eighth, eighth from the front. He’ll be first.
Heywood: Oh, bullshit. I’ll take that action.
Ernie: Yeah, me too.
Heywood: You’re out some smokes, son. Let me tell you.
Floyd: Well, Heywood, you’re so smart, you call it.
Heywood: I’ll take the chubby fat-ass there. The fifth one from the front. Put me down for a quarter deck.

[the prisoners continue to jeer and shout at the new prisoners]
Fresh Fish Con: Fresh fish! Fresh fish today! We’re reeling them in!
Red: [narrating] I must admit, I didn’t think much of Andy first time I laid eyes on him. Looked like a stiff breeze would blow him over. That was my first impression of the man.
Floyd: What do you say, Red?
Red: That tall drink of water with the silver spoon up his ass.
Ernie: That guy? Never happen.
Red: Ten cigarettes.
Floyd: That’s a rich bet.
Alright, who’s going to prove me wrong? Heywood? Jigger? Skeet? Floyd? Four brave souls.
[over the speakers]
Prison Guard Voice: Return to your cell blocks for evening count. All prisoners return to your cell blocks.

[to the new prisoners lined up]
Captain Hadley: Turn to the right! Eyes front.
[Norton steps forward to address the new prisoners]
Warden Norton: This is Mr. Hadley. He’s Captain of the Guards. I’m Mr. Norton, the Warden. You are convicted felons. That’s why they’ve sent you to me. Rule number one: No blasphemy. I’ll not have the Lord’s name taken in vain in my prison. The other rules, you’ll figure out as you go along. Any questions?
Hungry Fish Con: When do we eat?
[Hadley walks over to the prisoner]
Captain Hadley: You eat when we say you eat! You shit when we say you shit, and you piss when we say you piss! You got that, you maggot-dick motherfucker?
[Hadley hits him in the stomach with the end of his nightstick making the prisoner double over in pain]
Captain Hadley: On your feet.
Warden Norton: I believe in two things: Discipline and the Bible. Here you’ll receive both. Put your trust in the Lord. Your ass belongs to me. Welcome to Shawshank.
[Norton walks off]

[to the other guards]
Captain Hadley: Unhook them.
[Andy, now stripped naked, is hosed down with water]
Captain Hadley: Turn around.
[Andy turns and they hose him again]
Captain Hadley: That’s enough. Move to the end of the cage. Turn around. Delouse him.
[another guard throws a white powder over Andy’s back]
Captain Hadley: Turn around.
[the powder is thrown onto Andy’s front and catches his face]
Captain Hadley: Move out of the cage, go to your left, pick up your clothes and Bible. Next man up.

[the new prisoners who are all naked, are escorted their cells]
New Fish Guard: Right, right, right. Left, left…
Red: [narrating] The first night’s the toughest, no doubt about it. They march you in, naked as the day you were born, skin burning and half-blind from that delousing shit they throw on you. And when they put you in that cell, and those bars slam home, that’s when you know it’s for real. Old life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left but all the time in the world to think about it.
[Red watches as Andy is taken to his cell]
Red: [narrating] Most new fish come close to madness the first night. Somebody always breaks down crying. Happens every time. The only question is: Who’s it going to be? It’s as good a thing to bet on as any, I guess. I had my money on Andy Dufresne.

New Fish Guard: Lights out!
[the lights in the cells are turned off]
Red: [narrating] I remember my first night. Seems like a long time ago.
[the other prisoners start taunting the new arrivals]
Fresh Fish Con #1: Yoo-hoo! Fresh fish. Fish, fish, fish, fish, fishy.
Fresh Fish Con #2: Boy, are you scared of the dark?
Fresh Fish Con #1: You like it here, new fish?
Fresh Fish Con #2: You’ll wish your daddy never dicked your mommy.
Fresh Fish Con #3: Fishy! Oh, I want me a pork chop. Oh, yes!
Fresh Fish Con #1: You taking this down, new fish?
Fresh Fish Con #2: There’s going to be a quiz later!
Fresh Fish Con #3: Poke your ass out, give me a first look!
Fresh Fish Con #4: Shh! Keep it down.

Red: [narrating] The boys always go fishing with first-timers. And they don’t quit till they reel someone in.
Heywood: Hey, Fat Ass. Fat Ass. Talk to me, boy. I know you’re there. I can hear you breathing.
[Fat Ass is crying in his cell]
Heywood: Don’t you listen to these nitwits. You hear me? This place ain’t so bad. I tell you what. I’ll introduce you around, make you feel right at home. I know a couple of big old bull queers that would just love to make your acquaintance. Especially that big, white, mushy butt of yours.
Fat Ass: God! I don’t belong here!
Fresh Fish Con: We have a winner!
Fat Ass: I want to go home!
Heywood: And it’s Fat Ass by a nose!
Fresh Fish Con: Hey, it’s the fat guy! It’s the fat guy!
Heywood: Fresh fish! Fresh fish! Fresh fish!
Fat Ass: I don’t belong here!
[the other prisoners start singing along and clapping]
Fat Ass: I want to go home. I want my mama.
Fresh Fish Con: I had your mother! She wasn’t that great.

[as the prisoners are clapping and taunting Fat Ass Hadley and the other guards enter]
Captain Hadley: What the Christ is this happy horse shit?
Inmate: He took the Lord’s name in vain. I’m telling the Warden.
Captain Hadley: You’ll be telling him with my baton up your ass!
Fat Ass: You got to let me out of here!
Captain Hadley: What is your malfunction, you fat barrel of monkey spunk?
Fat Ass: Please, I ain’t supposed to be here. Not me!
Captain Hadley: I ain’t going to count to three. I’m not even going to count to one. You will shut the fuck up, or I’ll sing you a lullaby!
[as he listens from the next cell]
Heywood: Shut up, man. Shut up.

Fat Ass: Please! Please, there’s been a mistake! You don’t understand. I’m not supposed to be here!
Captain Hadley: Open that cell.
Inmate: Me neither. You people run this place like a fucking prison!
[the guard opens Fat Ass’s cell, Hadley drags him out by his hair and start beating him]
Captain Hadley: Son of a bitch.
Inmate: Take it easy.
[after Hadley beats Fat Ass to a pulp]
Captain Hadley: If I hear so much as a mouse fart in here the rest of the night, I swear by God and sonny Jesus, you will all visit the infirmary. Every last motherfucker in here!
[to the other guards]
Captain Hadley: Call the trustees. Take that tub of shit down to the infirmary.

Red: [narrating] His first night in the joint, Andy Dufresne cost me two packs of cigarettes. He never made a sound.

[next morning, the cell bars are opened and the inmates are ordered out of their cells for rollcall and breakfast, Red looks at Andy then they all go to breakfast; Andy sits near Red’s group and just as he goes to eat he finds a maggot in his food]
Brooks Hatlen: Are you, are you going to eat that?
Andy Dufresne: I hadn’t, I hadn’t planned on it.
Brooks Hatlen: Do you mind?
[Andy gives the maggot to Brooks]
Brooks Hatlen: Ah, that’s nice and ripe.
[Brooks feeds the maggot to the baby crow named Jake in his pocket]
Brooks Hatlen: Jake says thank you. Fell out of his nest over by the plate shop. I’m going to look after him until he’s big enough to fly.

[referring to Heywood]
Jigger: Oh, no, no. Here he comes.
[a smiling Heywood joins them at their table]
Heywood: Morning, fellas. Fine morning, ain’t it? You know why it’s a fine morning, don’t you? Come on, set them down. I want them all lined up here, just like a pretty little chorus line.
[the others hand over their cigarettes]
Heywood: Yeah, look at that! Look at that.
Jigger: I can’t stand this guy.
Heywood: Oh, Lord.
[he takes a sniff of the cigarettes]
Heywood: Yes. Richmond, Virginia.
Floyd: Smell my ass.
Skeet: After he smells mine.

Heywood: Jee, Red, it was a terrible shame about your horse coming in last, an’ all. But I sure do love that winning horse of mine, though. I believe I owe that boy a great big, sloppy kiss when I see him.
Red: Why don’t you give him some of your cigarettes, instead? Lucky fuck.
Heywood: Hey, Tyrell. You pull infirmary duty this week?
[Tyrell nods his head]
Heywood: How’s that horse of mine doing anyway?
Tyrell: Dead. Hadley busted his head up pretty good. The doc had already gone home for the night. Poor bastard lay there till this morning. By then, hell, there weren’t nothing we could do.
[everyone goes quiet]
Andy Dufresne: What was his name?
Heywood: What’d you say?
Andy Dufresne: I was just wondering if anyone knew his name.
Heywood: What the fuck do you care, new fish? It doesn’t fucking matter what his name was. He’s dead.

[as Andy is taking a shower with the other inmates Bogs takes the shower next to Andy’s]
Bogs Diamond: Hey, anybody come at you yet?
[Andy looks at him with confusion]
Bogs Diamond: Anybody get to you yet? Hey, we all need friends in here. I could be a friend to you.
[Andy walks away]
Bogs Diamond: Hey. Hard to get. I like that.

Red: [narrating] Andy kept pretty much to himself at first. I guess he had a lot on his mind,trying to adapt to life on the inside. It wasn’t until a month went by that he finally opened his mouth to say more than two words to somebody. As it turned out, that somebody was me.

[in the prison yard Andy approaches Red as he’s throwing ball with Heywood]
Andy Dufresne: I’m Andy Dufresne.
Red: The wife-killing banker. Why’d you do it?
Andy Dufresne: I didn’t, since you ask.
[Red laughs]
Red: You’re going to fit right in! Everybody in here is innocent. Didn’t you know that? Heywood, what you in here for?
Heywood: Didn’t do it! Lawyer fucked me.
[to Andy]
Red: Rumor has it you’re a real cold fish. You think your shit smells sweeter than most. Is that right?
Andy Dufresne: What do you think?
Red: Well, to tell you the truth, I haven’t made up my mind.

Andy Dufresne: I understand you’re a man that knows how to get things.
Red: I’m known to locate certain things, from time to time.
Andy Dufresne: I wonder if you might get me a rock hammer.
Red: A what?
Andy Dufresne: A rock hammer.
Red: What is it, and why?
Andy Dufresne: What do you care?
Red: Well, if it was a toothbrush, I wouldn’t ask questions, I’d just quote a price, but then a toothbrush is a non-lethal object, isn’t it?
Andy Dufresne: Fair enough. A rock hammer is about six or seven inches long. Looks like a miniature pickaxe.
Red: Pickaxe?
Andy Dufresne: For rocks.
Red: Rocks.

[Andy throws Red a small rock]
Red: Quartz?
Andy Dufresne: Quartz.
[Andy bends down and picks up more rocks]
Andy Dufresne: And some mica. Shale. Limestone.
Red: So?
Andy Dufresne: So, I’m a rock hound. At least, I was in my old life. I’d like to be again on a limited basis.
Red: Or maybe you’d like to stink your toy into somebody’s skull.
Andy Dufresne: No, sir. I have no enemies here. No? Wait a while. Word gets around.
Red: The Sisters have taken quite a liking to you. Especially Bogs.
[they look across the yard to see Bogs staring at Andy]
Andy Dufresne: I don’t suppose it would help any if I explained to them I’m not homosexual.
Red: Neither are they. You have to be human first. They don’t qualify.

Red: Bull queers take by force. It’s all they want or understand. If I were you, I’d grow eyes in the back of my head.
Andy Dufresne: Thanks for the advice.
Red: Well, that’s free. You understand my concern.
Andy Dufresne: Well, if there’s any trouble, I won’t use the rock hammer. Okay?
Red: Then I’d guess you want to escape. Tunnel under the wall, maybe.
[Andy chuckles]
Red: Did I miss something here? What’s funny?
Andy Dufresne: You’ll understand when you see the rock hammer.
Red: What’s an item like this usually go for?
Andy Dufresne: Seven dollars in any rock and gem shop.
Red: My normal mark-up’s twenty percent, but this is a specialty item. The risk goes up, the price goes up. Let’s make it an even ten bucks.
Andy Dufresne: Ten it is.
Red: Okay.

Red: Waste of money, if you ask me.
Andy Dufresne: Why’s that?
Red: Folks around this joint love surprise inspections. If they find it, you’re going to lose it. If they do catch you with it, you don’t know me. You mention my name, we never do business again. Not for shoelaces or a stick of gum. Now, you got that?
Andy Dufresne: I understand. Thank you, Mr., uh…?
Red: Red. The name’s Red.
Andy Dufresne: Red? Why do they call you that?
[Red thinks for a moment before replying]
Red: Maybe it’s because I’m Irish.

Red: [narrating] I could see why some of the boys took him for snobby. He had a quiet way about him. A walk and a talk that just wasn’t normal around here. He strolled like a man in a park, without a care or a worry in the world. Like he had on an invisible coat that would shield him from this place. Yeah. I think it would be fair to say, I liked Andy from the start.

[after the rock hammer is smuggled to Red via the laundry using some bedsheets]
Red: [narrating] Andy was right, I finally got the joke. It would take a man about six hundred years to tunnel under the wall with one of these.
[we see Brooks doing his mobile library round to the cells]
Brooks Hatlen: Book?
Inmate #1: Not today.
Brooks Hatlen: Book?
Inmate #2: No.
[as Brooks approaches Red’s cell]
Red: Hey, Brooksy. Delivery for Dufresne.
[Red puts the rock hammer, wrapped in a cloth, in Brooks’s book trolley, picks up a book and puts a pack of cigarettes in Brooks’s shirt pocket, Brooks then moves along to the next cells]
Brooks Hatlen: Book? Books?
[he comes to Andy’s cell]
Brooks Hatlen: Dufresne. Here’s your book.
[Brooks passes a book along with the rock hammer to Andy]
Andy Dufresne: Thanks.

[Andy’s in the laundry working when the boss approaches him]
Laundry Boss: Dufresne! We’re running low on Hexlite. Get on back and fetch us up some.
[when Andy goes to the Hexlite he’s cornered by Bogs and his men, Andy grabs a fist full of the cleaning powder]
Andy Dufresne: If you get this in your eyes, it blinds you.
Bogs Diamond: Honey, hush.
[one of Bogs’s men grabs hold of Andy from behind, Andy tries to fight them off but he held down by Bog’s men]
Bogs Diamond: That’s it, you fight. It’s better that way.
[Andy struggles again so Bogs and his men start punching and kicking him]
Red: [narrating] I wish I could tell you that Andy fought the good fight, and the Sisters let him be. I wish I could tell you that, but prison is no fairy-tale world. He never said who did it. But we all knew.

Red: [narrating] Things went on like that for a while. Prison life consists of routine, and then more routine. Every so often Andy would show up with fresh bruises. The Sisters kept at him. Sometimes he was able to fight them off, sometimes not. And that’s how it went for Andy. That was his routine. I do believe those first two years were the worst for him. And I also believe, if things had gone on that way, this place would have got the best of him. But then, in the spring of 1949, the powers that be decided that…
Warden Norton: The roof of the license-plate factory needs resurfacing. I need a dozen volunteers for a week’s work. As you know, special detail carries with it special privileges.
Red: [narrating] It was outdoor detail, and May is one damn fine month to be working outdoors.

[we see the inmates lining up to volunteer their names for the roof resurfacing job]
Captain Hadley: Stay in line there.
Red: [narrating] More than a hundred men volunteered for the job.
[we see Red whispering to one of guards to make a deal; next starts calling out Red and his friends names]
Guard Youngblood: Wallace E. Unger. Ellis Redding.
Red: [narrating] Wouldn’t you know it? Me and some fellows I know were among the names called.
Guard Youngblood: Andrew Dufresne.
Red: [narrating] Only cost us a pack of smokes per man. I made my usual twenty per cent, of course.

[as Andy, Red and his friends are working resurfacing the roof]
Captain Hadley: So, this big-shot lawyer calls me long-distance from Texas. I say, “Yeah?” He says, uh, “Sorry to inform you, but your brother just died.”
Guard Youngblood: Oh, damn, Byron. I’m sorry to hear that.
Captain Hadley: I’m not, he was an asshole. Ran off years ago. Figured him for dead, anyway. So anyway, this lawyer fella says to me, “Your brother died a rich man.” Oil wells and shit. Close to a million bucks.
Guard Trout: A million bucks?
Captain Hadley: Yeah. Fucking incredible how lucky some assholes get.
Guard Trout: Jeez, Louise! Are you going to see any of that?
Captain Hadley: Thirty-five thousand, that’s what he left me.
Guard Trout: Dollars?
Captain Hadley: Yep.
Guard Trout: Holy shit! That’s great. That’s like winning the sweepstakes! Isn’t it?
Captain Hadley: Dumb shit. What do you think the government’s going to do to me? Take a big, wet bite out of my ass, is what.

[as they are listening to Hadley’s conversation to the other guards; mockingly]
Heywood: Poor Byron! Terrible fucking luck, huh?
Red: Crying shame. Some people really got it awful.
[Red notices Andy’s stopped working and is looking at Hadley]
Red: Andy, are you nuts? Keep your eyes on your mop, man. Andy!
[Andy turns to continue working]
Guard Trout: Well, alright. You’re going to pay some taxes, but you’ll still end up…
Captain Hadley: Oh, yeah, yeah. Maybe enough to buy a new car. And then what? I’ve got to pay tax on the car. Repair, maintenance, goddamn kids pestering me to take them for a ride all the time. And at the end of the year, you figure the tax wrong, you got to pay them out of your own pocket. I tell you. Uncle Sam. He puts his hand in your shirt and squeezes your tits till it’s purple.

[Andy stops working, turns and starts walking towards Hadley]
Red: Andy! Andy!
Ernie: What’s he doing?
Heywood: Getting himself killed. Keep tarring.
[Andy continues to walk over to Hadley as he’s talking to the guards]
Captain Hadley: Some brother! Shit.
[suddenly Trout points his rifle at Andy]
Guard Trout: Hey!
Andy Dufresne: Mr. Hadley, do you trust your wife?
[Hadley takes out his nightstick]
Captain Hadley: Oh, that’s funny. You’re going to look funnier sucking my dick with no teeth.
Andy Dufresne: What I mean is, do you think she’d go behind your back, try to hamstring you?
Captain Hadley: That’s it. Step aside, Mert. This fucker’s having himself an accident.

[as they watch Hadley pushing Andy towards the edge of the roof]
Heywood: He’s going to push him off the roof.
[to Hadley as he’s getting ready to push him off the roof]
Andy Dufresne: Because if you do trust her, there’s no reason you can’t keep that thirty-five thousand!
Captain Hadley: What did you say?
[Hadley stops right at the edge of the roof and holds Andy by his shirt]
Andy Dufresne: Thirty-five thousand.
Captain Hadley: Thirty-five thousand?
Andy Dufresne: All of it.
Captain Hadley: All of it?
Andy Dufresne: Every penny.
Captain Hadley: You’d better start making sense.

Andy Dufresne: If you want to keep all that money, give it to your wife. The IRS allows a one-time-only gift to your spouse for up to sixty thousand dollars.
Captain Hadley: Bullshit! Tax-free?
Andy Dufresne: Tax-free. IRS can’t touch one cent.
Captain Hadley: You’re that smart banker what killed his wife, aren’t you? Why should I believe a smart banker like you? So I can end up in here with you?
Andy Dufresne: It’s practically legal. Go ask the IRS, they’ll say the same thing. Actually I feel stupid telling you this. I’m sure you would have investigated the matter yourself.
Captain Hadley: Yeah, fucking-A. I don’t need no smart wife-killing banker to tell me where the bears shit in the buckwheat.
Andy Dufresne: Of course not, but you do need someone to set up the tax-free gift for you and it’ll cost you. A lawyer, for example.
Captain Hadley: Bunch of ball-washing bastards.

Andy Dufresne: I suppose I could set it up for you. That would save you some money. If you get the forms, I’ll prepare them for you. Nearly free of charge. I’d only ask three beers a piece for each of my co-workers.
[Trout laughs]
Guard Trout: Co-workers. Get him. That’s rich, ain’t it?
Andy Dufresne: I think a man working outdoors feels more like a man if he can have a bottle of suds. That’s only my opinion, sir.
[Hadley turns to see Red and the others staring at them in shock]
Captain Hadley: What are you jimmies staring at?! Back to work!
[they quickly continue to tar the roof]
Guard Trout: Let’s go. Work!

Red: [narrating] And that’s how it came to pass, that on the second-to-last day of the job, the convict crew that tarred the plate factory roof in the spring of ’49 wound up sitting in a row at ten o’clock in the morning, drinking icy-cold, Bohemia-style beer, courtesy of the hardest screw that ever walked a turn at Shawshank State Prison.
Captain Hadley: Drink up while it’s cold, ladies.
Red: [narrating] The colossal prick even managed to sound magnanimous. We sat and drank with the sun on our shoulders and felt like free men. Hell, we could have been tarring the roof of one of our own houses. We were the lords of all creation.

Red: [narrating] As for Andy, he spent that break hunkered in the shade, a strange little smile on his face, watching us drink his beer.
[Heywood takes a beer and goes to offer to Andy]
Heywood: Hey. Want a cold one, Andy?
Andy Dufresne: No, thanks. I gave up drinking.
Red: [narrating] You could argue he’d done it to curry favor with the guards. Or maybe make a few friends among us cons. Me, I think he did it just to feel normal again, if only for a short while.

[Andy and Red are playing checkers sat in the prison yard]
Red: King me.
Andy Dufresne: Chess. Now, there’s a game of kings.
Red: What?
Andy Dufresne: Civilized, strategic.
Red: And a total fucking mystery. I hate it.
Andy Dufresne: Maybe you’ll let me teach you someday.
[Red chuckles]
Red: Sure.
Andy Dufresne: I’ve been thinking of getting a board together.
Red: Well, hey, you’re talking to the right man. I’m the guy that can get things, right?
Andy Dufresne: We might do business on a board, I want to carve the pieces myself. One side in alabaster, the opposing side in soapstone. What do you think?
Red: I think it’ll take years.
Andy Dufresne: Well, years I got. What I don’t have are the rocks. Pickings are pretty slim in the yard. Pebbles, mostly.

Red: Andy, we’re getting to be kind of friends, aren’t we?
Andy Dufresne: Yeah, I guess.
Red: Can I ask you something? Why’d you do it?
Andy Dufresne: I’m innocent, Red. Just like everybody else here. What are you in for?
Red: Murder. Same as you.
Andy Dufresne: Innocent?
Red: Only guilty man in Shawshank.

[Andy is carving up a chess piece in his cell when he notices the names Peter and Jenny carved into the wall, he then tries to carve his name into the wall; Andy goes to Red in the as the inmates are watching “Gilda” starring Rita Hayworth]
Andy Dufresne: Red.
Red: Ah, wait, wait, wait, wait. Here she comes. This is the part I like, just when she does that shit with her hair.
Andy Dufresne: Oh, yeah, I know. I’ve seen it three times this month.
[the inmates whoop when Rita Hayworth is shown flipping her hair back in the film]
Red: Hah! God, I love it!

Andy Dufresne: I understand you’re a man that knows how to get things.
Red: Yeah, I’m known to locate certain things from time to time. What do you want?
Andy Dufresne: Rita Hayworth.
Red: What?
Andy Dufresne: Can you get her?
[Red looks at Rita Hayworth on the screen before replying]
Red: Take a few weeks.
Andy Dufresne: Weeks?
Red: Well, yeah, Andy. I don’t have her stuffed down the front of my pants right now, I’m sorry to say. But I’ll get her. Relax.
Andy Dufresne: Thanks.

[as Andy is leaving the prison cinema area he is attacked by Bogs and his men who drag him into the projection room]
Bogs Diamond: Take a walk.
Projectionist: I got to change the reel!
Bogs Diamond: I said fuck off!
[the projectionist leaves the room]
Bogs Diamond: ain’t you going to scream?
Andy Dufresne: Let’s get this over with.
[Andy turns, picks up a film reel and hits Bogs and his men with it]
Rooster: He broke my fucking nose!
[Bogs’s men hold Andy as Bogs punches him in the stomach, Andy falls to his knees and Bogs take out his knife]

Bogs Diamond: Now, I’m going to open my fly and you’re going to swallow what I give you to swallow. Then when you’ve swallowed mine you’re going to swallow Rooster’s. You done broke his nose, I think he ought to have something to show for it.
Andy Dufresne: Anything you put in my mouth, you’re going to lose.
Bogs Diamond: No. You don’t understand. You do that, and I’ll put all eight inches of this steel in your ear.
Andy Dufresne: Alright. But you should know that sudden, serious brain injury causes the victim to bite down hard. In fact, I hear the bite reflex is so strong they have to pry the victim’s jaws open with a crowbar.
Bogs Diamond: Where do you get this shit?
Andy Dufresne: I read it. Know how to read, you ignorant fuck?
Bogs Diamond: Honey, you shouldn’t.
[Bogs starts punching Andy repeatedly]

Red: [narrating] Bogs didn’t put anything in Andy’s mouth, and neither did his friends. What they did do is beat him within an inch of his life. Andy spent a month in the infirmary. Bogs spent a week in the hole.
[we see Bogs being let out of solitary confinement]
Hole Guard: Time’s up, Bogs.
Bogs Diamond: It’s your world, boss.
[Bogs returns to his cell to find Hadley and another guard, Mert, in his cell]
Bogs Diamond: What?
[suddenly Hadley and Mert start beating Bogs who starts to crawl out of his cell in fear]
Guard Mert: Where’s he going?
Captain Hadley: Grab his ankles.
[Hadley and Mert grab Bogs by the ankle and proceed to pull him back into the cell]
Bogs Diamond: No! No! No! Help me! Aaah!

Red: [narrating] Two things never happened again after that. The Sisters never laid a finger on Andy again and Bogs never walked again. They transferred him to a minimum-security hospital upstate. To my knowledge, he lived out the rest of his days drinking his food through a straw.
[as they watch Bogs, who’s now in a wheelchair, being driven off]
Red: I’m thinking Andy could use a nice welcome back when he gets out of the infirmary.
Heywood: Sounds good to us. I figure we owe him that much for the beer.
Red: The man likes to play chess. Let’s get him some rocks.

[as they are digging up ground outside the prison Heywood finds a big rock and goes to show it to Red and the others]
Heywood: Guys. I got one. I got one. Look.
Floyd: Heywood, that isn’t soapstone. And it ain’t alabaster, either.
Heywood: What are you, a fucking geologist?
Snooze: He’s right. It ain’t.
Heywood: Well, what the hell is it?
Red: A horse apple.
Heywood: Bullshit.
Red: No, horse shit. Petrified.
Heywood: Oh, Jesus Christ!
[Heywood drops the feces as the others laugh at him]
Heywood: Oh, damn!

Red: [narrating] Despite a few hitches, the boys came through in fine style. And by the weekend he was due back, we had enough rocks saved up to keep him busy till rapture. I also got a big shipment in that week. Cigarettes, chewing gum, sipping whiskey, playing cards with naked ladies on them, you name it. And of course, the most important item: Rita Hayworth herself.
[when Andy is released from the infirmary, he finds the rocks as well as the poster of Rita Heyworth in his cell, along with a note: “No charge. Welcome back.”]

[as he’s mopping the floor he hears Norton and the guards coming and warns the others]
Ernie: Heads up. They’re tossing cells. Heads up. They’re tossing cells.
Warden Norton: One-nineteen. One-twenty-three.
[Andy is sitting in his cell reading the bible when Hadley enter his cell]
Captain Hadley: On your feet.
[Andy rises to his feet]
Captain Hadley: Face the wall.
[as Andy faces the wall Hadley and Trout toss his cell for contraband, then Norton enters]
Captain Hadley: Turn around and face the Warden.
[Andy turns to face Norton who takes the bible his hand]
Warden Norton: Pleased to see you reading this. Any favorite passages?
Andy Dufresne: “Watch ye, therefore, for ye know not when the master of the house cometh.”
Warden Norton: Mark 13:35. I always liked that one. But I prefer, “I’m the light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”
Andy Dufresne: John, Chapter 8, Verse 12.

Warden Norton: I hear you’re good with numbers. How nice. A man should have a skill.
[referring to the sandpapers in Andy’s cell]
Captain Hadley: want to explain this?
Andy Dufresne: It’s called a rock blanket. It’s for shaping and polishing rocks. A little hobby of mine.
[Hadley looks at the rocks, picks one up to smell it]
Captain Hadley: It’s pretty clean. Some contraband here, but nothing to get in a twist over.
[Norton then notices Andy’s Rita Heyworth poster on the wall]
Warden Norton: I can’t say I approve of this. But I suppose exceptions can be made.
[Norton and Hadley walk out of Andy’s cell]
Captain Hadley: Lock them up!
[as the cells are being locked Norton turns]
Warden Norton: I almost forgot. I’d hate to deprive you of this.
[he gives back Andy’s through the cell bars]
Warden Norton: Salvation lies within.
Andy Dufresne: Yes, sir.
[Norton turns and leaves]

Red: [narrating] Tossing cells was just an excuse. The truth is, Norton wanted to size Andy up.
[Andy is shown into Norton’s office, Andy notices needlework framed on his office wall which says “His Judgment Cometh and That Right Soon”]
Warden Norton: My wife made that in church group.
Andy Dufresne: Very nice, sir.
Warden Norton: Do you enjoy working in the laundry?
Andy Dufresne: No, sir, not especially.
Warden Norton: Well perhaps we can find something more befitting a man of your education.

[Andy is transfered to the prison library where he finds Brook’s crow, Jake]
Andy Dufresne: Hey, Jake. Where’s Brooks?
Brooks Hatlen: Andy. I thought I heard you out here.
Andy Dufresne: I’ve been reassigned to you.
Brooks Hatlen: I know, they told me.
[he laughs]
Brooks Hatlen: ain’t that a kick in the head? Well, I’ll give you the dime tour. Come on.
[he takes Andy to the small room containing all the books]
Brooks Hatlen: Well, here she is. Shawshank Prison library. National Geographics. Reader’s Digest, condensed books. Louis L’Amour. Look Magazine. Erle Stanley Gardners. Every evening, I load up the cart and make my round. I enter the names on this clipboard here. Easy-peasy, Japanesey. Any questions?

Andy Dufresne: Brooks, how long have you been librarian?
Brooks Hatlen: Oh, I come here in ’05, and they made me librarian in 1912.
Andy Dufresne: And in all that time, have you ever had an assistant?
Brooks Hatlen: No. No, not much to it, really.
Andy Dufresne: Well, why me? Why now?
Brooks Hatlen: I don’t know, but it’ll be nice to have some company down here for a change.
Captain Hadley: Dufresne!
[Andy turns and walks over to Hadley who’s there with another guard named Dekins]
Captain Hadley: That’s him. That’s the one.
[Hadley leaves and Dekins walks over to Andy]

Dekins: I’m Dekins. I was, uh, thinking about maybe setting up some kind of trust fund for my kids’ educations.
Andy Dufresne: Oh, I see. Well, um, why don’t we have a seat and talk it over?
[Andy goes to puts some chairs down by a table]
Andy Dufresne: Brooks, do you have a piece of paper and a pencil?
[Brooks get him a pencil and some paper]
Andy Dufresne: Thanks. So, Mr. Dekins…

[later at lunch Brooks recounts Andy and Dekins meeting to the others]
Brooks Hatlen: And then Andy says, “Mr. Dekins, do you want your sons to go to Harvard, or Yale?”
Floyd: He didn’t say that?
Brooks Hatlen: As God is my witness, he did! Dekins just blinked for a second, and then he laughed himself silly. And afterwards he actually shook Andy’s hand.
Heywood: My ass!
Brooks Hatlen: Shook his hand.
[Brooks laughs]
Brooks Hatlen: Hell, I near soiled myself! All Andy needed was a suit and a tie and a little jiggly hula girl on his desk, and he would have been, “Mr. Dufresne, if you please.”

Red: Making a few friends, huh, Andy?
Andy Dufresne: I wouldn’t say “friends”. I’m a convicted murderer who provides sound financial planning. It’s a wonderful pet to have.
Red: Got you out of the laundry, though, didn’t it?
Andy Dufresne: Well, it might do more than that. How about expanding the library, get some new books in there?
Ernie: If you’re going to ask for something, ask for a pool table.
Snooze: Right.
Heywood: How do you expect to do that? I mean, get new books in here, Mr. Dufresne, if you please?
Andy Dufresne: Ask the Warden for funds.
[the others laugh]
Brooks Hatlen: Son, son, son, six wardens have been through here in my tenure, and I’ve learned one immutable, universal truth. Not one of them born whose asshole wouldn’t pucker up tighter than a snare drum when you asked them for funds.

[after Andy’s asked Norton for funds]
Warden Norton: The budget’s stretched thin as it is.
Andy Dufresne: I see. Perhaps I could write to the State Senate and request funds directly from them.
Warden Norton: As far as they’re concerned there’s only three ways to spend the tax payers hard earned money when it comes to prisons: more walls, more bars and more guards.
Andy Dufresne: Still, I’d like to try, with your permission. I’ll write a letter a week. They can’t ignore me forever.
Warden Norton: Sure can. But you write your letters if it makes you happy. I’ll even mail them for you. How’s that?
Red: [narrating] So, Andy started writing a letter a week, just like he said. And, just like Norton said, Andy got no answers.

Red: [narrating] The following April, Andy did tax returns for half the guards at Shawshank. The year after that, he did them all, including the Warden’s. The year after that, they rescheduled the start of the intramural season to coincide with tax season. The guards on the opposing teams all remembered to bring their W-2s.
[we see Andy meeting with each prison guard]
Andy Dufresne: So, Moresby Prison issued you your gun, but you actually had to pay for it?
Moresby Batter: Damn right. The holster, too.
Andy Dufresne: See that’s tax-deductible. You can write that off.

Red: [narrating] Yes, sir. Andy was a regular cottage industry. In fact, it got so busy at tax time, he was allowed a staff.
[we see Red assisting Andy]
Andy Dufresne: Hey, Red, can you hand me a stack of 10-40s?
Red: [narrating] It got me out of the wood shop a month out of the year, and that was fine by me. And still he kept sending those letters.

[Floyd rushes over to Red and Andy in the prison yard]
Floyd: Red, Andy. It’s Brooks.
[Red, Andy and Floyd go to the library; to Floyd]
Red: Watch the door.
Jigger: Please, Brooks. Just calm the fuck down.
[Brooks is holding a knife to Heywood’s throat]
Brooks Hatlen: Stay back! Stay back! Stab back there!
Red: What the hell’s going on?
Jigger: You tell me. One second he’s fine, then out comes the knife.
Red: Brooks. Brooks, we can talk about this, right?
Brooks Hatlen: Nothing to talk about, Goddamn it! It’s all talked out. I’m going to cut his fucking throat!
Red: Heywood? Wait, what’s he done to you?
Brooks Hatlen: It’s what they done! I got no choice.

Andy Dufresne: Brooks, you’re not going to hurt Heywood. We all know that, even Heywood knows that. Right, Heywood?
Heywood: Yeah, I know that, sure.
Andy Dufresne: You know why you’re not going to hurt him? Because he’s a friend of yours and because Brooks Hatlen is a reasonable man.
Red: That’s right. That’s right. Isn’t that right, guys?
Jigger: Yes!
Andy Dufresne: So put the knife down. Brooks. Brooks, look at me. Put the knife down. Brooks. Look at his neck, for God’s sake. Brooks, look at his neck. He’s bleeding.
[Brooks starts weeping]
Brooks Hatlen: It’s the only, it’s the only way they’d let me stay.

Andy Dufresne: Come on, this is crazy. You don’t want to do this. Come on. Put it down.
[Brooks lets go of Heywood and drops the knife as he weeps, Andy tries to comfort him]
Andy Dufresne: Hey, hey. Come on. Take it easy. You’re going to be alright.
Heywood: Him? Hell, what about me? Crazy old fool goddamn near cut my throat.
Red: Ah, shit, Heywood, you’ve had worse from shaving. What the hell did you do to set him off, anyway?
Heywood: I ain’t do nothing! I come in here to say fare-thee-well. ain’t you heard? His parole’s come through.

[later as they’re all sat in the prison yard]
Andy Dufresne: I just don’t understand what happened in there, that’s all.
Heywood: The old man’s as crazy as a rat in a tin shithouse is what.
Red: Oh, Heywood, that’s enough out of you!
Snooze: I heard he had you shitting in your pants.
Heywood: Fuck you!
Red: Would you knock it off? Brooks ain’t no bug. He’s just, he’s just institutionalized.
Heywood: Institutionalized, my ass.

Red: The man’s been in here fifty years, Heywood. Fifty years. This is all he knows. In here, he’s an important man. He’s an educated man. Outside, he’s nothing. Just a used-up con with arthritis in both hands. Probably couldn’t get a library card if he tried. You know what I’m trying to say?
Floyd: Red, I do believe you’re talking out of your ass. You believe whatever you want, Floyd. But I’m telling you, these walls are funny. First you hate them, then you get used to them. Enough time passes you get so you depend on them. That’s institutionalized.
Jigger: Shit. You can never get like that.
Ernie: Oh, yeah? Say that when you’ve been here as long as Brooks has.
Red: Goddamn right. They send you here for life, that’s exactly what they take. The part that counts, anyway.

[we see Brooks getting to ready to leave prison]
Brooks Hatlen: I can’t take care of you no more, Jake. You go on, now. You’re free. You’re free.
[he lets Jake go and he flies off through the prison window; later the guards let Brooks out]
Brooks Hatlen: Bye.
Guard: Good luck, Brooks.
[Brooks steps outside the prison gates looking lost and sad]
Brooks Hatlen: [voice over] Dear fellas, I can’t believe how fast things move on the outside.
[we see Brooks trying to cross the road and nearly getting run over]
Man in Car: Watch it, old-timer! Are you trying to get killed?

Brooks Hatlen: [voice over] I saw an automobile once, when I was a kid, but now they’re everywhere. The world went and got itself in a big damn hurry. The parole board got me into this halfway house called The Brewer, and a job bagging groceries at the Foodway. It’s hard work, and I try to keep up, but my hands hurt most of the time.
[we see Brooks bagging groceries]
1954 Food-Way Woman: Make sure your man double bags. Last time he didn’t double bag and the bottom near came out.
[to Brooks]
1954 Food-Way Manager: Make sure you double bag, like the lady says. You understand?
Brooks Hatlen: Yes, sir. I surely will.

Brooks Hatlen: [voice over] I don’t think the store manager likes me very much. Sometimes, after work, I go to the park and feed the birds. I keep thinking Jake might just show up and say hello. But he never does. I hope wherever he is, he’s doing okay and making new friends. I have trouble sleeping at night. I have bad dreams, like I’m falling. I wake up, scared. Sometimes it takes me a while to remember where I am. Maybe I should get me a gun and rob the Foodway, so they’d send me home. I could shoot the manager, while I was at it. Sort of like a bonus. I guess I’m too old for that sort of nonsense any more.

[we see Brooks packing in his room]
Brooks Hatlen: [voice over] I don’t like it here. I’m tired of being afraid all the time. I’ve decided not to stay. I doubt they’ll kick up any fuss. Not for an old crook like me.
[Brooks steps up on a table and starts etching the inscription “BROOKS WAS HERE” into the wall, he then knocks the table down and we see he’s hanged himself]

See more The Shawshank Redemption Quotes

[back in prison Andy is reading Brooks’ letter to the others]
Andy Dufresne: “I doubt they’ll kick up any fuss. Not for an old crook like me. PS. Tell Heywood I’m sorry I put a knife to his throat. No hard feelings. Brooks.”
Red: He should have died in here.

[referring to the shipment of library materials that has arrived]
Captain Hadley: What the fuck have you done? It’s a goddamn mess, I’ll tell you that.
Andy Dufresne: What’s all this?
Captain Hadley: You tell me, fuck-stick. They’re all addressed to you.
[Wiley holds out a letter to Andy]
Guard Wiley: Take it.
[Andy takes the letter, opens it and reads it out loud]
Andy Dufresne: “Dear Mr. Dufresne, in response to your repeated enquiries, the State has allocated the enclosed funds for your library project.”
[referring to the check]
Andy Dufresne: This is two hundred dollars.
[continues reading the letter]
Andy Dufresne: “In addition, the Library District has generously responded with a charitable donation of used books and sundries. We trust this will fill your needs. We now consider the matter closed. Please stop sending us letters.”
Captain Hadley: I want all this cleared out before the Warden gets back.
Andy Dufresne: Yes, sir.
[Hadley leaves]

Guard Wiley: Good for you, Andy.
Andy Dufresne: Wow. It only took six years. From now on, I’ll write two letters a week, instead of one.
Guard Wiley: Oh, I believe you’re crazy enough. Now you’d better get all this stuff out, like the Captain said. Now, I’m going to go pinch a loaf. When I come back, this is all gone, right?
[Wiley leaves]
Andy Dufresne: Wow.
[as Wiley is in the bathroom, Andy rifles through the records and finds Mozart’s “The Marriage of Figaro” and starts playing it]
Guard Wiley: Andy, do you hear that?
[Andy then decides to lock Wiley in the bathroom, lock the room he’s in, turns on the prison’s PA system so the whole prison can hear the music]
Guard Wiley: Dufresne? Dufresne? Andy, let me out! Andy? Andy?

[we see everyone in the prison at a standstill as they listen to the music Andy’s playing]
Red: [narrating] I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. The truth is, I don’t want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can’t be expressed in words and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a grey place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away. And for the briefest of moments every last man at Shawshank felt free.

[Norton and Hadley with some other guards try to unlock the door in the room Andy’s in]
Red: [narrating] It pissed the Warden off something awful.
Warden Norton: Open the door. Open it up! Dufresne, open this door! Turn that off! I am warning you, Dufresne. Turn that off!
[instead of turning off the record Andy turns up the volume and smiles]
Captain Hadley: Dufresne. You’re mine now.
[Hadley busts through the door and turn off the record player]
Red: [narrating] Andy got two weeks in the hole for that little stunt.
Captain Hadley: On your feet!

[two weeks later in the prison cafeteria]
Ernie: Hey, look who’s here. Maestro!
[Andy joins them]
Heywood: You couldn’t play something good, huh? Hank Williams or something?
Andy Dufresne: They broke the door down before I could take requests.
Snooze: Was it worth it, two weeks in the hole?
Andy Dufresne: Easiest time I ever did.
Skeet: Bullshit! There’s no such thing as easy time in the hole.
Snooze: That’s right. A week in the hole is like a year.
Ernie: Damn straight.
Andy Dufresne: I had Mr. Mozart to keep me company.
Floyd: So, they let you tote that record player down there, huh?
[Andy taps his head]
Andy Dufresne: It was in here.
[then his heart]
Andy Dufresne: And in here. That’s the beauty of music, they can’t get that from you.

Andy Dufresne: Haven’t you ever felt that way about music?
Red: Well, I played a mean harmonica as a younger man. Lost interest in it, though. Didn’t make much sense in here.
Andy Dufresne: Here’s where it makes the most sense. You need it, so you don’t forget.
Red: Forget?
Andy Dufresne: Forget that there are places in the world that aren’t made out of stone, that there’s a, there’s something inside that they can’t get to, that they can’t touch. It’s yours.
Red: What are you talking about?
Andy Dufresne: Hope.
Red: Hope? Let me tell you something, my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane. It’s got no use on the inside. You’d better get used to that idea.
Andy Dufresne: Like Brooks did?
[Red, looking angry, leaves the table]

[1957 Parole Hearings – Red enters the room]
1957 Parole Hearings Man: Sit down.
[Red takes a seat]
1957 Parole Hearings Man: It says here that you’ve served thirty years of a life sentence. You feel you’ve been rehabilitated?
Red: Oh, yes, sir. Without a doubt. And I can honestly say I’m a changed man. No danger to society here. God’s honest truth. Absolutely rehabilitated.
[we see Red getting a “Rejection” stamp in his parole file]

[after his parole rejection Red meets with Andy in the prison yard]
Red: Thirty years. Jesus, when they say it like that…
Andy Dufresne: You wonder where it went. I wonder where ten years went.
[there’s a pause and Andy hands Red a small box]
Andy Dufresne: Here. Little parole rejection present. Go ahead and open it. I had to go through one of your competitors, I hope you don’t mind. I wanted it to be a surprise.
[Red opens the box to find a harmonica]
Red: It’s very pretty, Andy. Thank you.
Andy Dufresne: Are you going to play it?
Red: No. Not right now.

[Andy enters his cell to settle in for the night he finds a poster of Marilyn Monroe and a note from Red
“A new girl for your 10 year anniversary. Red”
[then as Andy sits staring at the poster Red looks a his harmonica and half-heartedly plays it for a moment]

Red: [narrating] Andy was as good as his word. He wrote two letters a week instead of one. In 1959 the State Senate finally clued into the fact they couldn’t buy him off with just a two hundred dollar check. Appropriations Committee voted an annual payment of five hundred dollars just to shut him up. And you’d be amazed how far Andy could stretch it. He made deals with book clubs, charity groups. He bought remaindered books by the pound.

[as they are sorting through the books obtained by the money Andy received]
Heywood: Treasure Island. Robert Louis…
Andy Dufresne: Stevenson. Fiction, adventure. What’s next?
Red: I got here Auto Repair and Soap Carving.
Andy Dufresne: Trade skills and hobbies. Goes under Educational, the stack behind you.
Heywood: The Count Of Monte Crisco.
Floyd: That’s Cristo, you dumb shit.
[Red laughs]
Heywood: By Alexandree Dumass. Dumb-ass?
[Red laughs again]
Andy Dufresne: Dumb-ass?
[Heywood smiles and shows Andy the name written in the book]
Andy Dufresne: Dumas. You know what that’s about?
Heywood: Uh-uh.
Andy Dufresne: You’ll like it, it’s about a prison break.
Red: We ought to file that under Educational, too, oughtn’t we?

Red: [narrating] The rest of us did our best to pitch in when and where we could. By the year Kennedy was shot, Andy had transformed a storage room smelling of rat turds and turpentine into the best prison library in New England, complete with a fine selection of Hank Williams.
[we see Heywood in the library singing along to Hank Williams as he listen to the music]

Red: [narrating] That was also the year Warden Norton instituted his famous “Inside-Out” program. You may remember reading about it. It made all the papers and got his picture in Look Magazine.
[we see Norton giving a speech at a press conference]
Warden Norton: No free ride. But rather a genuine, progressive advance in corrections and rehabilitation. Our inmates, properly supervised, will be put to work outside these walls, performing all manner of public service. These men can learn the value of an honest day’s labor, while providing a valuable service to the community and at a bare minimum of expense to Mr. and Mrs. John Q Taxpayer.
Red: [narrating] Of course, Norton failed to mention to the press that “bare minimum of expense” is a fairly loose term. There are a hundred different ways to skim off the top. Men, materials, you name it. And, oh, my Lord, how the money rolled in.

[as they walk through prisoners working outside the prison]
Ned Grimes: If this keeps up, you’re going to put me out of business.
Warden Norton: Ned!
Ned Grimes: This pool of slave labor you’ve got, you can underbid any contractor in town.
Warden Norton: Ned, we’re providing a valuable community service here.
Ned Grimes: Well, that’s fine for the papers but I’ve got a family to feed. Sam. Sam, we go back a long way. I need this new highway contract. I don’t get it and I go under, that’s a fact. You just have some of this fine pie my missus made especially for you, and you think about that.
[he opens the edge of the pie box to reveal an envelope of cash tucked next to the pie]
Warden Norton: Ned, I wouldn’t worry too much about this contract. It seems to me I already got my boys committed elsewhere. You be sure and thank Maisie for this fine pie.

Red: [narrating] And behind every shady deal, behind every dollar earned, there was Andy, keeping the books.
[Norton enters his office where Andy is working on the books]
Andy Dufresne: Two deposits. Maine National and New England First. Night drops as always, sir.
[Andy and Norton walk over to the Norton’s vault hidden behind his wife’s needlepoint, Norton opens the vault and Andy places the records book in there]
Warden Norton: Get my stuff down to laundry. Two suits for dry-clean and a bag of whatnot.
Andy Dufresne: Yes, sir.
Warden Norton: Tell them they over-starch my shirts again they’re going to hear about it from me.
Andy Dufresne: Yes, sir.

Warden Norton: How do I look?
Andy Dufresne: Very nice, sir.
Warden Norton: Big charity to-do up Portland way. The Governor’s going to be there.
Andy Dufresne: Hm.
[pointing to the pie Ned had given to him earlier]
Warden Norton: You want the rest of this?
[he gives the pie box to Andy]
Warden Norton: Woman can’t bake worth shit.
Andy Dufresne: Thank you, sir.

[Andy and Red are returning the library books to the shelves as they eat the pie Norton gave to Andy]
Red: He’s got his fingers in a lot of pies from what I hear.
Andy Dufresne: What you hear isn’t half of it. He’s got scams you haven’t even dreamed of. Kickbacks on his kickbacks. There’s a river of dirty money running through this place.
Red: Yeah, but the problem with having all that money is that sooner or later you’re going to have to explain where it came from.
Andy Dufresne: Well that’s where I come in. I channel it, filter it, funnel it. Stocks, securities, tax-free municipals. I send that money out into the real world and when it comes back…
Red: Clean as a virgin’s honey pot, huh?
Andy Dufresne: Cleaner. By the time Norton retires, I’ll have made him a millionaire.

Red: If they ever catch on, though, he’s going to wind up in here wearing a number himself.
Andy Dufresne: Now, Red, I thought you had a little more faith in me than that.
Red: I know. I know you’re good, Andy, but all that paper leaves a trail. Now, anybody gets curious, the FBI, IRS, whatever, it’s going to lead to somebody.
Andy Dufresne: Well sure it is, but not to me. And certainly not to the Warden.
Red: Alright, who?
Andy Dufresne: Randall Stevens.
Red: Who?
Andy Dufresne: The silent silent partner. He’s the guilty one, Your Honor. The man with the bank accounts. It’s where the filtering process starts. If they trace anything, it’s just going to lead to him.
Red: But who is he?
Andy Dufresne: He’s a phantom, an apparition. Second cousin to Harvey the Rabbit. I conjured him out of thin air. He doesn’t exist, except on paper.

Red: Andy, you can’t just make a person up.
Andy Dufresne: Well sure you can, if you know how the system works, where the cracks are. It’s amazing what you can accomplish by mail. Mr. Stevens has a birth certificate, a driver’s license, social security number.
Red: You’re shitting me?
Andy Dufresne: If they ever trace any of those accounts, they’re going to wind up chasing a figment of my imagination.
Red: Well, I’ll be damned. Did I say you were good? Shit, you’re a Rembrandt!
Andy Dufresne: You know, the funny thing is, on the outside, I was an honest man, straight as an arrow. I had to come to prison to be a crook.
[Red laughs]

[Andy and Red are playing checkers in the prison yard]
Red: Ever bother you?
Andy Dufresne: I don’t run the scams, Red, I just process the profits. Fine line maybe, but I’ve also built that library and used it to help a dozen guys get their high school diploma. Why do you think the Warden lets me do all that?
Red: To keep you happy and doing the laundry. Money instead of sheets.
Andy Dufresne: Well, I work cheap. That’s the trade-off.

[we see another prison bus arriving with a batch of new prisoners]
Red: [narrating] Tommy Williams came to Shawshank in 1965 on a two-year stretch for B and E. That’s breaking and entering to you. The cops caught him sneaking TV sets out the back door of a JC Penney. Young punk. Mr. Rock’n’roll. Cocky as hell.
[as Tommy works along with the other prisoners]
Tommy: Hey, come on, old boys! Moving like molasses! You’re making me look bad.
Red: [narrating] We liked him immediately.

[as they are all sat in the prison cafeteria]
Tommy: So I’m backing out the door, right? Now I got the TV like this. It was a big old thing. I couldn’t see shit. Suddenly, I hears this voice. “Freeze, kid! Hands in the air.” Well, I just stand there, holding onto that TV. So, finally, the voice says, “Do you hear what I said, boy?” I say, “Yes, sir, I sure did. But if I drop this fucking thing, you got me on destruction of property, too.”
[the others laugh]

Heywood: Hey, you’ve done a stretch in Cashman, right?
Tommy: Yeah. Yeah, that was an easy piece of time, let me tell you. Weekend furloughs, work programs. Not like here.
Snooze: Sounds like you done time all over New England.
Tommy: Yeah, I’ve been in and out since I was thirteen. You name the place, chances are I’ve been there.
Andy Dufresne: Perhaps it’s time you tried a new profession.
[Tommy looks at him confused]
Andy Dufresne: What I mean is, you don’t seem to be a very good thief. Maybe you should try something else.
Tommy: Yeah, well, what the hell do you know about it, Capone? What are you in for?
Andy Dufresne: Me? The lawyer fucked me.
[Heywood chuckles]
Andy Dufresne: Everybody’s innocent in here. Don’t you know that?
[the others laugh]

Red: [narrating] As it turned out, Tommy had himself a young wife and a new baby girl. Maybe it was the thought of them on the streets or his child growing up not knowing her daddy. Whatever it was, something lit a fire under that boy’s ass.
[Tommy approaches Andy in the prison library]
Tommy: I was thinking of maybe trying for my high school equivalency. I hear you helped a couple of fellas with that.
Andy Dufresne: I don’t waste time on losers, Tommy.
Tommy: I ain’t no goddamn loser.
Andy Dufresne: You mean that?
Tommy: Yeah.
Andy Dufresne: You really mean that?
Tommy: Yes, sir, I do.
Andy Dufresne: Good. Because if we do this, we do it all the way. A hundred percent, nothing half-assed.
Tommy: The thing is, see, uh, I don’t read so good.
Andy Dufresne: Well. You don’t read so well. We’ll get to that.

[we see Andy teaching Tommy to read]
Andy Dufresne: R.
Tommy: R.
Andy Dufresne: S.
Tommy: S.
Andy Dufresne: T…
Red: [narrating] So Andy took Tommy under his wing. He started walking him through his ABC’s. Tommy took to it pretty well, too. The boy found brains he never knew he had.Before long, Andy started him on his course requirements. He really liked the kid. It gave him a thrill to help a youngster crawl off the shit heap. But that wasn’t the only reason. Prison time is slow time, so you do what you can to keep going. Some fellas collect stamps, others build matchstick houses. Andy built a library. Now he needed a new project. Tommy was it. It was the same reason he spent years shaping and polishing those rocks. The same reason he hung his fantasy girlies on the wall. In prison, a man will do most anything to keep his mind occupied. By 1966, right about the time Tommy was getting ready to take his exams, it was lovely Raquel.
[we see a giant poster of Raquel Welch now occupying Andy’s wall]

[Tommy is sitting his exam in the library overseen by Andy]
Andy Dufresne: Time. Well?
Tommy: Well, it’s for shit. I wasted a whole fucking year of my time with this bullshit.
Andy Dufresne: It’s probably not as bad as you think.
Tommy: Yeah, it’s worse. I didn’t get a fucking thing right. It might as well have been in Chinese.
Andy Dufresne: Let’s see how the score comes out.
Tommy: Yeah, well, I’ll tell you how the goddamn score comes out.
[he screws up his exam paper answers and throws it into the trash bin]
Tommy: Two points, right there! There’s your goddamn score! Goddamn cats crawling up trees! Five times five is twenty-five! Fuck this place! Fuck it!
[he storms out in anger and Andy retrieves Tommy’s screwed up paper from the trash bin]

Tommy: I feel bad. I let him down.
Red: Ah, that’s crap, kid. He’s proud of you. We’ve been friends a long time so I know him as good as anybody.
Tommy: Smart fellow, ain’t he?
Red: As smart as they come. Used to be a banker on the outside.
Tommy: What’s he in here for, anyway?
Red: Murder.
Tommy: The hell you say!
Red: You wouldn’t think it to look at the guy. Caught his wife in bed with some golf pro. Greased them both.
[Tommy looks shocked]
Red: What?

[Tommy recounts his tale to Andy and Red]
Tommy: About four years ago, I was in Thomaston on a two-to-three stretch. I stole a car. It was a dumb-fuck thing to do. About six months left to go, I get a new cell mate in. Elmo Blatch. Big, twitchy fucker. Kind of roomie you pray you don’t get. You know what I’m saying? Six-to-twelve, armed burglary. He said he’d pulled hundreds of jobs. Hard to believe, high-strung as he was. You’d cut a loud fart, he’d jump three feet in the air. Talked all the time, too. That’s the other thing, he never shut up. Places he’d been in, jobs he’d pulled, women he’d fucked. Even people he’d killed. People who gave him shit. That’s how he put it.

Tommy: So, one night, like a joke, I say to him, I say, “Yeah, Elmo, who’d you kill?” So he says…
[in flashback we see Elmo replying to Tommy]
Elmo Blatch: I got me this job one time bussing tables at a country club. So I could case
all these big rich pricks that come in. So I pick out this guy, go in one night and do his place. He wakes up. He gives me shit. So I killed him. Him and this tasty bitch he was with.
[Elmo starts laughing]
Elmo Blatch: That’s the best part. She’s fucking this prick, see, this golf pro. But she’s married to some other guy, some hotshot banker. And he’s the one they pinned it on.
[Andy, looking shocked, leaves to tell Norton]

[in Norton’s office after Andy’s told him about Tommy’s story]
Warden Norton: I have to say that’s the most amazing story I ever heard. What amazes me most is you were taken in by it.
Andy Dufresne: Sir?
Warden Norton: Well, it’s obvious this fella Williams is impressed with you. He hears your tale of woe and quite naturally wants to cheer you up. He’s young, not terribly bright. Not surprising he wouldn’t know what a state he’d put you in.
Andy Dufresne: Sir, he’s telling the truth.
Warden Norton: Well, let’s say, for the moment, this Blatch does exist. You think he’d just fall to his knees and cry, “Yes, I did it! I confess! Oh, and by the way, add a life term to my sentence”?
Andy Dufresne: You know that wouldn’t matter. With Tommy’s testimony I can get a new trial.
Warden Norton: Well that’s assuming Blatch is even still there. The chances are excellent he’d be released by now.
Andy Dufresne: Well, they’d have his last known address, names of relatives. There’s a chance, isn’t there?
[Norton shakes his head]

Andy Dufresne: How can you be so obtuse?
Warden Norton: What? What did you call me?
Andy Dufresne: Obtuse. Is it deliberate?
Warden Norton: Son, you’re forgetting yourself.
Andy Dufresne: The country club will have his old timecards, records, W-2’s, with his name on them.
Warden Norton: Dufresne, if you want to indulge this fantasy, that’s your business. Don’t make it mine. This meeting is over.
Andy Dufresne: Sir, if I were to ever get out, I would never mention what goes on in here. I’d be just as indictable as you for laundering that money.
[Norton rises and slams his hand on his desk in anger]
Warden Norton: Don’t ever mention money to me again, you sorry son of a bitch! Not in this office, not anywhere!
[presses the button his intercom]
Warden Norton: Get in here, now.

Andy Dufresne: I’m just trying to set your mind at ease, that’s all. Sir, I didn’t mean…
[two guards enter Norton’s office]
Warden Norton: Solitary. A month!
Guard: Yes, sir.
Andy Dufresne: What’s the matter with you?
Warden Norton: Get him out of here.
[Andy gets dragged away by the two guards]
Andy Dufresne: This is my chance to get out! Don’t you see? It’s my life! Don’t you understand? It’s my life!
Warden Norton: Get him out! Get him out!
Andy Dufresne: This is my life! No!

[in the prison yard]
Floyd: A month in the hole. It’s the longest damn stretch I ever heard of.
Tommy: It’s all my fault.
Red: Oh, bullshit. You didn’t pull the trigger and you certainly didn’t convict him.
Heywood: Red, are you saying that Andy is innocent? I mean, for real innocent?
Red: Well it looks that way.
Heywood: Sweet Jesus. How long has he been here now?
Red: 1947. What is that? Nineteen years.
Ernie: Nineteen years.

[as the prisoners are getting their post]
Guard: Williams, Thomas.
Tommy: Yeah, over here.
[the envelope gets passed down to Tommy]
Red: What you got? “Board of Education.”
Tommy: The son of a bitch mailed it.
Red: Looks like he did. You going to open it or you going to stand there with your thumb up your butt?
Tommy: Thumb up my butt sounds better.
[suddenly Skeet takes the envelope and passes it around playfully]
Tommy: Hey, Skeet, come on. Give me that, you shithead. Floyd, come on.
Snooze: Over here, over here!
[Snooze passes it to Red]
Tommy: Snooze! Red! Come on, will you throw that away, please?
[Red opens the envelope and reads the letter]
Red: Well, shit.

[a guard delivers Andy his food]
Elderly Hole Guard: The kid passed. C+ average. Thought you’d like to know.
[Andy smiles to himself]

[as Tommy is mopping the prison corridor a guard approaches him]
Guard: The Warden wants to talk.
[the guard takes Tommy outside the prison walls]
Tommy: Out here?
Guard: That’s what the man said.
[the guard leaves and Tommy walks over to Norton]
Tommy: Warden?
Warden Norton: Tommy. Tommy, I’m asking you to keep this conversation just between us. I feel awkward enough as it is.
[he offers Tommy a cigarette and lights it up for him]
Warden Norton: We got a situation here. I think you can appreciate that.
Tommy: Yes, sir. I sure can.

Warden Norton: I tell you, son, this thing really came along and knocked my wind out. It’s got me up nights, that’s the truth. The right thing to do. Sometimes it’s hard to know what that is. Do you understand? I need your help, son. If I’m going to move on this, there can’t be the least little shred of doubt. I have to know that what you told Dufresne was the truth.
Tommy: Yes, sir. Absolutely.
Warden Norton: Would you be willing to swear before a judge and jury having placed your hand on the Good Book and taken an oath before Almighty God himself?
Tommy: Just give me that chance.
Warden Norton: That’s what I thought.
[Norton pats Tommy on the arm, puts out his cigarette, looks up, and walks away, Tommy looks at the same spot and sees Hadley with a rifle who shoots Tommy four times]

[Andy still in solitary gets a visit from Norton]
Warden Norton: I’m sure by now you’ve heard. A terrible thing. A man that young, less than a year to go, trying to escape. It broke Captain Hadley’s heart to shoot him. Truly, it did. We just have to put it behind us. Move on.
Andy Dufresne: I’m done. Everything stops. Get someone else to run your scams.
Warden Norton: Nothing stops. Nothing.
[Norton leans in closer to Andy]
Warden Norton: Or you will do the hardest time there is. No more protection from the guards. I’ll pull you out of that one-bunk Hilton and cast you down with the Sodomites. You’ll think you’ve been fucked by a train. And the library? Gone. Sealed off, brick by brick. We’ll have us a little book barbecue in the yard. They’ll see the flames for miles. We’ll dance around it like wild Indians. You understand me? Catching my drift? Or am I being obtuse?
[to Hadley as Norton turns to leave]
Warden Norton: Give him another month to think about it.
[Hadley closes and locks the cell]

[Andy is sat on the ground in the prison yard when Red joins him]
Andy Dufresne: My wife used to say I’m a hard man to know. Like a closed book. Complained about it all the time. She was beautiful. God, I loved her. I just didn’t know how to show it, that’s all. I killed her, Red. I didn’t pull the trigger, but I drove her away. And that’s why she died, because of me. The way I am.
Red: That don’t make you a murderer. A bad husband, maybe. Feel bad about it if you want to, but you didn’t pull the trigger.
Andy Dufresne: No, I didn’t. Somebody else did, and I wound up in here. Bad luck, I guess.
Red: Yeah.
Andy Dufresne: It floats around. It’s got to land on somebody. It was my turn, that’s all. I was in the path of the tornado. I just didn’t expect the storm would last as long as it has.

Andy Dufresne: Do you think you’ll ever get out of here?
Red: Me? Yeah. One day, when I’ve got a long white beard and two or three marbles rolling
around upstairs, they’ll let me out.
Andy Dufresne: I tell you where I’d go. Zihuatanejo.
Red: Zi…what?
Andy Dufresne: Zihuatanejo. It’s in Mexico. A little place on the Pacific Ocean. You know what the Mexicans say about the Pacific?
Red: No.
Andy Dufresne: They say it has no memory. That’s where I want to live the rest of my life. A warm place with no memory. Open up a little hotel, right on the beach. Buy some worthless old boat and fix it up new. Take my guests out charter fishing.
Red: Zihuatanejo, huh?

Andy Dufresne: In a place like that, I could use a man who knows how to get things.
Red: I don’t think I could make it on the outside, Andy. I’ve been in here most of my life. I’m an institutional man now, just like Brooks was.
Andy Dufresne: Well, I think you underestimate yourself.
Red: I don’t think so. I mean, in here I’m the guy who can get things for you, sure. But outside, all you need is the Yellow Pages. Hell, I wouldn’t even know where to begin. The Pacific Ocean? Shit. About scare me to death, something that big.
Andy Dufresne: Not me. I didn’t shoot my wife and I didn’t shoot her lover. Whatever mistakes I’ve made, I’ve paid for them and then some. That hotel, that boat, I don’t think that’s too much to ask.

Red: I don’t think you ought to be doing this to yourself, Andy. These are just shitty pipe dreams. I mean, Mexico is way the hell down there and you’re in here, and that’s the way it is.
Andy Dufresne: Yeah, right. That’s the way it is. It’s down there and I’m in here. I guess it comes down to a simple choice really. Get busy living or get busy dying.
[Andy gets up to leave]
Red: Andy.
[Andy stops and turns to Red]
Andy Dufresne: Red. If you ever get out of here, do me a favor.
Red: Sure, Andy. Anything.
Andy Dufresne: There’s a big hayfield up near Buxton. You know where Buxton is?
Red: Well, there’s a lot of hayfields up there.
Andy Dufresne: One in particular. It’s got a long rock wall with a big oak tree at the north end. It’s like something out of a Robert Frost poem. It’s where I asked my wife to marry me. We went there for a picnic and made love under that oak, and I asked and she said yes.

Andy Dufresne: Promise me, Red, if you ever get out, find that spot.At the base of that wall, you’ll find a rock that has no earthly business in a Maine hayfield. A piece of black, volcanic glass. There’s something buried under it I want you to have.
Red: What, Andy? What’s buried under there?
Andy Dufresne: You’ll have to pry it up to see.
[Andy turns and walks off]

[later Red is sat having lunch in the cafeteria with the others]
Red: No, I’m telling you, the guy is, he’s talking funnier. I’m really worried about him.
Skeet: We ought to keep an eye on him.
Jigger: That’s fine during the day, but at night he’s got that cell all to himself.
Heywood: Oh, Lord.
Red: What?
Heywood: Andy come down to the loading dock today. He asked me for a length of rope.
Red: Rope?
Heywood: Six feet long.
Snooze: And you gave it to him?
Heywood: Sure I did. Why wouldn’t I?
Floyd: Jesus, Heywood.
Heywood: Hey, how the hell was I supposed to know?
Floyd: Remember Brooks Hatlen?
Jigger: No. Andy’d never do that. Never.
Red: I don’t know. Every man has his breaking point.

[Andy is back working in Norton’s office]
Warden Norton: Lickety-split. I want to get home.
Andy Dufresne: Just about finished, sir.
[Norton opens his safe as usual, Andy gives Norton an envelope]
Andy Dufresne: Three deposits tonight.
[the Andy places the record book and files in the safe and Norton closes the safe]
Warden Norton: Get my stuff down to the laundry. And shine my shoes. I want them looking like mirrors.
Andy Dufresne: Yes, sir.
Warden Norton: It’s good having you back, Andy. The place wasn’t the same without you.
[Norton turns and leaves, Andy starts shining Norton’s shoes then heads back to his cell, Red watches him with worry]

[Andy is sat in his cell]
Guard: Lights out!
[the lights go out and Andy gets the piece of rope he got from Heywood earlier]
Red: [narrating] I’ve had some long nights in the stir. Alone in the dark with nothing but your thoughts, time can draw out like a blade. That was the longest night of my life.

[the next morning, the inmates get out of their cells for rollcall]
Guard Haig: Give me a count.
Guard #2: Tier 3 South. Clear.
Guard #3: Tier 4 North. Clear.
Guard #4: Tier 3 North. Clear.
Guard #5: Man missing on Tier 2, Cell 245.
Guard Haig: Dufresne! Get your ass out here, boy. You’re holding up the show.
[Andy doesn’t come out]
Guard Haig: Don’t make me come down there, I’ll thump your skull for you!
[he makes his way to Andy’s cell]
Guard Haig: Damn it, Dufresne, you’re putting me behind! I got a schedule to keep. You’d better be sick or dead in there, I shit you not! You hear me?
[when he gets to Andy’s cell he’s shocked at what he finds]
Guard Haig: Oh, my holy God.
[as Norton is about to put the shoes Andy had shined the night before, he finds a well worn standard prison shoes in the box, at the same time prison siren go off]

[to Hadley as they go to Andy’s cell]
Warden Norton: I want every man on this cell block questioned. Start with that friend of his.
Captain Hadley: Who?
[he points to Red as they walk past his cell]
Warden Norton: Him!
Captain Hadley: Open 237.
[in Andy’s cell]
Warden Norton: What do you mean, he just wasn’t here? Don’t say that to me, Haig. Don’t say that to me again.
Guard Haig: But, sir, he wasn’t.
Warden Norton: I can see that, Haig! You think I’m blind? Is that what you’re saying? Am I blind, Haig?
Guard Haig: No, sir.

[to Hadley as he hands him the previous night’s counts]
Warden Norton: What about you? Are you blind? Tell me what this is.
Captain Hadley: Last night’s count.
Warden Norton: Mm-hmm. You see Dufresne’s name there? I sure do. See? Right there. Dufresne. He was in his cell at lights out. It stands to reason he’d still be here in the morning! I want him found. Not tomorrow, not after breakfast. Now!
Guard Haig: Yes, sir!
[Haig leaves with the other guards]
Guard Haig: Let’s go, let’s go! Move your butts! Move it!

[Hadley orders Red to enter Andy’s cell]
Captain Hadley: Stand.
[Norton turns to Red]
Warden Norton: Well?
Red: Well, what?
Warden Norton: I see you two all the time. You’re thick as thieves, you are. He must have said something.
Red: No, sir, Warden. Not a word.
Warden Norton: Lord, it’s a miracle! A man up and vanished like a fart in the wind! Nothing left but some damn rocks on a windowsill.
[he takes the rocks]
Warden Norton: And that cupcake on the wall. Let’s ask her. Maybe she knows.

[to Andy’s Raquel Welch poster]
Warden Norton: What say there, Fuzzy Britches? Feel like talking? Ahh, I guess not. Why should she be any different? This is a conspiracy, that’s what this is. One big..
[he starts throwing Andy’s rocks at Red and Hadley]
Warden Norton: …damn conspiracy! And everyone’s in on it! Including her!
[he throws a rock at the poster, the rock goes right through it and they hear it clattering, Norton puts his arm through the torn poster and rips it away from the wall, revealing a large hole which Andy has escaped through]

Red: [narrating] In 1966, Andy Dufresne escaped from Shawshank Prison. All they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap and an old rock hammer, damn near worn down to the nub. I remember thinking it would take a man six hundred years to tunnel through the wall with it. Old Andy did it in less than twenty.

[we see flashback to when Andy tried to carve his name into the wall with the hammer many years ago; part of it gave away, crumbles to the ground and he picks it up]
Red: [narrating] Oh, Andy loved geology. I imagine it appealed to his meticulous nature. An Ice Age here, a million years of mountain-building there.
[Andy is sat in his cell looking at the broken piece of cement in his hand and crumbling it]
Red: [narrating] Geology is the study of pressure and time. That’s all it takes, really. Pressure and time. That and a big goddamn poster.

[we see Andy using the rock hammer to dig into the wall behind the poster of Rita Hayworth]
Red: [narrating] Like I said, in prison a man will do most anything to keep his mind occupied. It turns out Andy’s favorite hobby was toting his wall out into the exercise yard. A handful at a time. I guess after Tommy was killed, Andy decided he’d been here just about long enough.

[we see the last night before his escape when he was in Norton’s office finishing working]
Warden Norton: Lickety-split. I want to get home.
Andy Dufresne: I’m just about finished, sir.
[as Norton goes to open the safe we see Andy switching the record book and files with dummy copies and concealing them behind his trousers, beneath his jacket]
Andy Dufresne: Three deposits tonight.
[he hands the envelope to Norton and places the dummy record book and files in the safe]
Red: [narrating] Andy did like he was told, buffed those shoes to a high mirror shine. The guard simply didn’t notice, neither did I. I mean, seriously, how often do you really look at a man’s shoes?
[we see as Andy was walking back to his cell he was wearing Norton’s shoes, inside his cell we see he’s wearing Norton’s suit underneath his prison clothes, he takes them off and starts packing his things in a plastic bag along with Norton’s record book and files]

[Andy’s crawling through the tunnel with his plastic bag tied to his foot with the rope he’d gotten from Heywood, he climbs down a pipe to the ground and then comes across a large sewer pipe, he busts through the pipe using a massive rock, timing the hits with the lightning strikes]
Red: [narrating] Andy crawled to freedom through five hundred yards of shit-smelling foulness I can’t even imagine. Or maybe I just don’t want to. Five hundred yards. That’s the length of five football fields, just shy of half a mile.

Red: [narrating] The next morning, right about the time Raquel was spilling her little secret, a man nobody ever laid eyes on before strode into the Maine National Bank. Until that moment, he didn’t exist, except on paper.
[we see a man entering a bank and going to the bank teller]
Bank Teller: May I help you?
Red: [narrating] He had all the proper ID, driver’s license, birth certificate, social security card. And the signature was a spot-on match.
[we see bank manager looking at Randall Stephens ID and Andy sitting opposite him]
Bank Manager: I must say, I’m sorry to be losing your business. I hope you’ll enjoy living abroad.
Andy Dufresne: Thank you. I’m sure I will.
Bank Teller: Here’s your cashier’s check, sir. Will there be anything else?
Please. Would you add this to your outgoing mail?
[he hands the teller a large envelope]
Bank Teller: I’d be happy to.
[Andy rises and shakes the manager’s hand]
Andy Dufresne: Good day, sir.
Bank Manager: Good day.
[Andy turns and walks away]

Red: [narrating] Mr. Stevens visited nearly a dozen banks in the Portland area that morning. All told, he blew town with better than three hundred and seventy thousand dollars of Warden Norton’s money. Severance pay for nineteen years.
[we then see the envelope that Andy had asked to be mailed was sent to a reporter at the Portland Daily Bugle which contains the record book and files that Andy took from Norton]

[we see Norton slamming down a newspaper bearing the headline “Corruption, Murder at Shawshank – D.A. Has Ledger – Indictments Expected”, as the police are on their way to the prison, Norton finds Andy’s bible in his safe, in it is a note written from Andy]
“Dear Warden. You were right. Salvation lay within. Andy Dufresne.”
[Norton flips through a couple of pages to find the outline of the rock hammer that was hidden in the Book of Exodus within the Bible, and then drops it on the floor in shock]

[outside the prison the D.A. gets out of his car and approaches Hadley]
1966 D.A.: Byron Hadley?
[Hadley nods his head]
1966 D.A.: You have the right to remain silent. If you give up the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be held against you in a court of law.
Red: [narrating] I wasn’t there to see it, but I hear Byron Hadley started sobbing like a little girl when they took him away.
[Norton watches Hadley being arrested from his office window]
Red: [narrating] Norton had no intention of going that quietly.
[as the D.A. and his officers make their way to Norton’s office we see Norton going to his desk, getting out a gun and some bullets]

[the D.A. tries to enter Norton’s office but it’s locked]
1966 D.A.: Samuel Norton, we have a warrant for your arrest. Open up.
[as the D.A. knocks on the door Norton loads his gun]
1966 D.A.: Norton!
[to one of the prison guards]
1966 D.A.: Open the door.
Duty Guard: I’m not sure which key it is.
1966 D.A.: Norton! Make it easy on yourself, Norton.
[Norton points his gun at the door as the D.A. tries to enter, then he places the gun under his chin and pulls the trigger, killing himself]
Red: [narrating] I like to think the last thing that went through his head, other than that bullet, was to wonder how the hell Andy Dufresne ever got the best of him.

Red: [narrating] Not long after the Warden deprived us of his company, I got a postcard in the mail. It was blank but the postmark said, Fort Hancock, Texas. Fort Hancock. Right on the border, that’s where Andy crossed. When I picture him heading south in his own car with the top down, it always makes me laugh.
[we see Red looking up Fort Hancock on the map and then laughing to himself]
Red: [narrating] Andy Dufresne, who crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side. Andy Dufresne, headed for the Pacific.
[we see Andy driving in his red convertible car heading towards the Pacific]

[Red and the others are sitting at the cafeteria table, laughing as Heywood is telling one of Andy’s exploits and everyone laughing]
Heywood: Hadley’s got him by the toes, right? And he says, “I believe this boy’s about to have himself an accident.”
Red: [narrating] Those of us who knew him best talk about him often. I swear, the stuff he pulled…
Heywood: “…these friends of mine could use a couple of beers!”
Floyd: And he got it.
Heywood: And he got it!

Red: [narrating] Sometimes it makes me sad, though, Andy being gone. I have to remind myself that some birds aren’t meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright. And when they fly away, the part of you that knows it was a sin to lock them up does rejoice. But still, the place you live in is that much more drab and empty that they’re gone. I guess I just miss my friend.

1967 Parole Hearings Man: Please sit down. [Red takes a seat]
1967 Parole Hearings Man: Ellis Boyd Redding. Your files say you’ve served forty years of a life sentence. Do you feel you’ve been rehabilitated?
Red: Rehabilitated? Well, now, let me see. You know, I don’t have any idea what that means.
1967 Parole Hearings Man: Well, it means you’re ready to rejoin society…
Red: I know what you think it means, sonny. To me, it’s just a made-up word. A politician’s word so that young fellas like yourself can wear a suit and a tie and have a job. What do you really want to know? Am I sorry for what I did?
1967 Parole Hearings Man: Well, are you?
[1967 Parole Hearings – Red enters the room]
Red: There’s not a day goes by I don’t feel regret. Not because I’m in here or because you think I should. I look back on the way I was then: A young, stupid kid who committed that terrible crime. I want to talk to him. I want to try and talk some sense to him, tell him the way things are. But I can’t. That kid’s long gone and this old man is all that’s left. I got to live with that. Rehabilitated? It’s just a bullshit word. So you go on and stamp your form, sonny, and stop wasting my time. Because to tell you the truth, I don’t give a shit.
[we see Red getting an “Approved” stamp in his parole file]

[we see Red leaving prison, riding a bus and arriving at the same room were Brooks stayed, Red looks up to see Brooks inscription on the wall, we then see Red working the same job, bagging groceries]
Red: Here you go, miss.
[Red looks over to his boss]
Red: Rest room break, boss?
[the manager indicates for Red to come over]
1967 Food-Way Manager: You don’t need to ask me every time you need to go take a piss. Just go. Understand?
Red: Yes, sir.
Red: [narrating] Forty years I’ve been asking permission to piss. I can’t squeeze a drop without say-so.

Red: [narrating] There’s a harsh truth to face. No way I’m going to make it on the outside.
[Red stops outside a pawn shop window to look at some guns then past to a compass]
Red: [narrating] All I do any more is think of ways to break my parole, so maybe they’d send me back.
[Red is sat in his room alone]
Red: [narrating] A terrible thing to live in fear. Brooks Hatlen knew it, knew it all too well. All I want is to be back where things make sense, where I won’t have to be afraid all the time. Only one thing stops me. A promise I made to Andy.
[he looks at the compass he’s bought]

[Red hitches a ride to Buxton]
Truck Driver: Here it is.
[Red gets out of the truck]
Red: Much obliged, sir.
[Red then walks to the hayfields, he uses the compass to find the rock wall and oak tree that Andy had mentioned to him, he eventually finds the black volcanic rock and under it he finds a tin which contains an envelope with money and a note; Red reads the note]
Andy Dufresne: [voice over] Dear Red, if you’re reading this, you’ve gotten out. And if you’ve come this far, maybe you’re willing to come a little further. You remember the name of the town, don’t you?
Red: Zihuatanejo.
Andy Dufresne: [voice over] I could use a good man to help me get my project on wheels. I’ll keep an eye out for you and the chessboard ready. Remember, Red, hope is a good thing. Maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies. I will be hoping that this letter finds you and finds you well. Your friend, Andy.

[we see Red in his room, getting out his pen knife and looking up at the wall]
Red: [narrating] Get busy living or get busy dying. That’s goddamn right.
[he packs his bag and leaves, as he leaves we see he’s etched another inscription next to Brooks’ in the wall, which says “SO WAS RED”]

[we see Red lining up to buy a bus ticket]
Red: [narrating] For the second time in my life, I’m guilty of committing a crime: Parole violation. Of course, I doubt they’ll toss up any roadblocks for that. Not for an old crook like me.
[to the clerk]
Red: Fort Hancock, Texas, please.

[last lines; we see Red riding on a bus to Fort Hancock looking out the window]
Red: [narrating] I find I’m so excited I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it’s the excitement only a free man can feel. A free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain. I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope.
[we see Red walking barefoot on the beach towards Andy, who is polishing up an old boat, as they meet they embrace each other]

Total Quotes: 145

The Shawshank Redemption Quotes – ‘Get busy living or get busy dying.’

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