Shawshank Redemption Conflict Analysis

There are a number of conflicts Frank Darabont used to show institutionalisation in the film Shawshank Redemption. This is shown in physical, verbal, internal conflict between the prisoners, guards and the warden.
Conflict can be found in the form of physical violence. At Shawshank prison physical violence was not only common between the inmates but the guards were also violent toward the prisoners. The first few years Andy was at Shawshank Red’s voice over stated he would, “every so often, turn up with fresh bruises”. This went on for a long time on a regular base. The “sisters” who were responsible for this violence abused other inmates such as Andy, quite frequently as a way to keep themselves satisfied from the boring repetitive institutional …show more content…
As much as institutionalisation can be something the prisoners all come to depend on, before this they all loathed the thought of having someone in control of them. Due to Andy’s innocence he clearly knew that being institutionalised was not meant to be his fate. Therefore when Andy was asked to defend himself in court he stated in a slightly raised and aggravated voice, “Since I am innocent of this crime, sir, I find it decidedly inconvenient that the gun was never found”. This shows that Andy clearly did not want to be institutionalised and as a result of this caused slight conflict between Andy and the judge. Andy hardly ever argued with the warden and showed him great respect but after a while Andy had become fed up with submitting to the wardens demands after the warden had refused to treat him and other prisoners fairly. In a low angle camera shot the warden standing in the entrance way of a confined cell where Andy has been for the last few weeks, Andy looks very insignificant to the towering warden as he argues, “Everything stops; get someone else to run your scam”. Andy is sick of being used as free labour, and being made to work in the institutional system of the prison. Tommy had been in an out of prison for most of his life from a very young age. On the arrival of Shawshank and the coaxing from Andy he decided to attempt to turn his life around and complete the schooling he had missed due to being imprisoned. Tommy struggles on one of his tests and throws his books and papers everywhere shouting at Andy “I didn’t get a thing right, it might as well have been written in Chinese”. This shows that when institutionalisation started to enter Tommy’s life he wants to try hard at turning his life around to not fall into the trap of being institutionalised. The argument between Andy and Tommy arose because Tommy was nervous that he wouldn’t be able to undo all the wrong he has done and