The Best Shawshank Redemption Quotes By Movie and TV Quotes  [174 more lists]

Red: "I guess I just miss my friend."

This is one of the final scenes in 'The Shawshank Redemption," when Red is lamenting the loss of the now-escaped Andy. A powerful monologue, with several highly quotable lines.

Andy: "The funny thing is, I was an honest man, straight as an arrow. I had to come to prison to be a crook."

When Andy arrives at Shawshank, Red notices immediately that he isn't like other inmates. He's not. Over time, Andy does indeed become a crook - eventually escaping from the prison in dramatic fashion.

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 bulls**t 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 s**t."

At his parole hearing, Red asserts his own terms of redemption, explaining that his definition is quite different from that of the system. A stunning scene with the incomparable Morgan Freeman, without question.

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 s**t 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. A whole life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left but all the time in the world to think about it."

Andy's friendship with veteran inmate Red is instrumental to his survival behind the walls of Shawshank.

Red: "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."

Red's quote is part of his monologue that ends the movie. We learn that yes, he does indeed realize his dreams - about reuniting with Andy and about finally being free.