‘My wife left and took the kids after watching The Shawshank Redemption’

The Shawshank Redemption is widely recognised as one of the greatest ever films – but thousands have still left scathing reviews for it.

Since its 1994 release, the flick has become a Hollywood classic, and marched it’s way to the top of the IMDb’s list for most revered by its viewers with an impressive 9.3/10 rating. It follows the story of two convicts who form a close friendship behind bars over several years.

But not everyone of the film is a fan. In fact 42,000 viewers have weighed in on IMDb to give the film a one star rating, and left some rather scathing reviews while they were at it.

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One of the most brutal reviews was: “My wife left and took the kids after watching this.”

Another said: “It tells us as much about what prison is really like as Pretty Woman tells us about what prostitution is really like.” Another wrote: “There are some things in this life we will never understand… How did the universe begin? What happens to our souls when we die? How did a movie as bland as The Shawshank Redemption become so overrated?”

A third unimpressed viewer said: “This film is nothing but one cliche after another. Having seen many of the 100’s of prison films made from the early 30’s to the 50’s, I was able to pull almost every minute of Shawc**p from one of those films.”

Others just felt the film didn’t belong in its lofty place in the list. One questioned: “Does it really belong in the same company as Godfather, Godfather II, Schindler’s List, and other consensus top-ten films? Is it really one of the ten best films of all time?”

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Another said: “So many movies are better, this ranking is absolutely absurd! This movie should not be number one, it’s shouldn’t even be in the top 250!”

While a third confused viewer wrote: “I simply cannot understand what this film has that deserves being in the list of the best films of all time. Like… what is it???”

There were even some who just weren’t in the least bit interested in what they had to sit through.

One wrote: “Watching it started to feel like a prison sentence. While a third added: “Maybe the film is too old for my generation but I just found it boring, predictable, overrated and long.”

Obviously it goes without saying that these opinions are very much in the minority, with more than 2.8million votes cast on the film. Of those ratings made, 1.5million gave the film 10 stars, while 722k gave it nine.

Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk