In case you weren’t aware, The Shawshank Redemption is on TV. There might not be another film that cable networks air more and each certainly have gotten their money’s worth when they purchased Frank Darabont’s 1994 Acadamy Award-nominated classic. “It didn’t win an Oscar?” you ask your computer monitor expecting it to answer. No, not a single one, but hey, it was up against the award freight train known as Forrest Gump that year.
The people over at YouTube channel Cinefix bring us their latest 8-Bit Cinema with The Shawshank Redemption and I could not be happier. The actual film has an effect on me. No matter what I may be doing, it stops me in my tracks and somehow tricks me into watching it from any point and I cannot stop until I see Andy Dufresne wave to good ol Red on the beach in Zihuatanejo. I have watched the movie so many times that I didn’t even have to Google the spelling of Dufresne OR Zihuatanejo. Shawshank just has that much control over my life, which is why I now have Cinefix to thank for this six minute Cliffnotes version that I believe, with some effort, will help me take back control of my afternoons on my days off.
The 8-bit version hits all the memorable beats the film is known for. The Rita Hayworth and Raquel Welch posters, the rock hammer and disposal of the wall debris in the prison yard, even the unfortunate run ins with Bogs and “The Sisters”. Playing out in true video game fashion, we see Andy make his escape — after calling the warden obtuse, of course — by digging through the wall and timing hits on the sewage pipe with the thunder outside. The video even boasts an 8-bit musical homage to “Canzonetta sull’aria” from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “Marriage of Figaro” and a credits sequence where Red visits the oak tree in Buxton, Maine to find what Andy left for him.
Check out the rest of the 8-bit cinema on Cinefix’s YouTube channel and check out some screenshots of some pivotal 8-bit scenes from Shawshank in the gallery below.
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What films would you like to see in an 8-bit style? Lets us know in the comments below!