Hope.............

Last night I was watching the movie "The Shawshank Redemption" for the 2nd time. 1st time I watched this movie 7 years back.That time I had wondered that why is this movie rated the best ever. No doubt that movie is brilliant but is it best ever. Last night , I watched this movie again to get an answer to the doubt I had in mind.

For those who have not watched this movie,its about a person who is wrongly convicted for life for double murder and he escapes the high security prison after spending 20 long years there.Seems to be an average storyline, but it's definitely  not.This movie depicts and celebrates human spirit ,in a way, no other has ever done.It show that "hope" indeed is the most beautiful thing in life.

Hope is the guiding light of life.Hope impacts our life more than anything including love. Hope is the light for life and its absence is not only depression but complete darkness.

In this movie the main protagonist is convicted of murder of his wife and her paramour. He is given double life sentence and land in a very high security prison. Anyone would have resigned to his fate at this juncture. But he didn’t. He had some thing which others don't have.He had a hope,a dream that one day he will get out of there and live his rest of his life leisurely at a beautiful seashore town in Mexico. A dream that was impossible for him to realize. But he didn't give up.For twenty years he slowly dug a tunnel inside jail's wall with a hammer not bigger than his palm. For twenty years he used to dig handfull of stones every night.Just in the hope that one day he might get a chance to escape.And man...he did escape.He dreamed what no other prisoner had ever dreamed and he achieved it too.He didn't escape like a macho hero ,who is so powerful that prison’s wall can not contain him.He escaped like a mouse from a tunnel which took him twenty years to dig. And that too didn't guarantee him a escape but just a chance and hope.
In a letter the protagonist writes," Hope is a beautiful thing,perhaps the most beautiful thing.And no beautiful thing ever dies".

Indeed Hope is the most beautiful thing.It is perhaps the most important thing in life. It's this hope which give rise to dreams.The hope of making those dreams come true give us reason enough to live.Hope of seeing light gives us energy to walk in the darkest of nights.Without hope we could have stopped walking and those who don't walk are just better than dead.They are zombies. And its not the zombies who drive this world forward. They are the drag force on the forward movement of world.

There was a psychologist (whose name I don't remember) who did a research on the holocaust survivors.And he reported that its not the physical strength of those survivors that made them survive hardship of Concentration camp while million others died.Infact they were as physically strong as the rest of population who perished.He found that the only thing different in these people from the rest of population was that they had a better vision of ther future.Infact they were better day dreamers.It is this hope that life will be better again one day made them survive while others died for hunger and disease ( I am not talking about those who were physically killed).

After the movie I tried to imagine myself without hope.To my terror I was dead in my imgination.I tried to imagine world without hope.And I saw each of us still residing on trees.

Now I realize why this movie is considered greatest.I also realized that many persons saw its greatness much before I did.I realized that there are many who are ahead of me in many respect.But I  hope that one day there won't be one.