The prisoners in the movie The Shawshank Redemption watch a classic Rita Hayworth film that has more significance than it seems. Written and directed by Frank Darabont, the iconic prison drama was adapted from the Stephen King novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, originally included in his collection Different Seasons. Rita Hayworth was one of the biggest stars of the 1940s. She doesn’t appear in The Shawshank Redemption, but she is central to the plot. Not only is one of Hayworth’s movies screened for the prisoners, but Andy Dufresne also uses a big poster of Hayworth to conceal the tunnel he’s digging out of his cell.
Although it bombed at the box office on its initial release, The Shawshank Redemption has since come to be regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made. It sits comfortably in the number-one spot on IMDb’s “Top 250” list. Since The Shawshank Redemption begins its story in 1947, a lot of the movie's cultural references were obscure to modern audiences even when it first arrived in theaters. The Rita Hayworth movie that appears in The Shawshank Redemption was from a crucial juncture in her Hollywood career, and it bears similarities with The Shawshank Redemption’s own plot.
Gilda Is The Rita Hayworth Movie In The Shawshank Redemption
The movie starring Rita Hayworth that Andy and his fellow inmates are shown in The Shawshank Redemption is called Gilda. Released in 1946, Gilda is a film noir about a casino owner who learns that his new wife and his right-hand man are former lovers. Hayworth played the title character opposite George Macready as her husband and Glenn Ford as her ex-lover. Now widely regarded as a classic, Gilda is notable for cinematographer Rudolph Maté’s lavish visuals, choreographer Jack Cole’s elaborate moves, and the iconic costumes that Jean Louis designed for Hayworth’s dance numbers.
Gilda Mundson was the defining role of Rita Hayworth’s career. But the movie isn’t just shown in The Shawshank Redemption because Hayworth was a sex symbol at the time. There are parallels between the plots of Gilda and The Shawshank Redemption. Gilda drives a wedge between her new husband and her former lover; Andy is in prison for the murders of his wife and her lover. In both cases, the characters are motivated by jealous rage in their relationships and end up causing their own downfall when that jealousy gets the better of them.
Why The Shawshank Redemption Changed Stephen King's Title
In adapting Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption for the screen, Frank Darabont shortened the title and dropped Hayworth’s name. When the movie first entered development under the novella’s original title, it was mistaken for a biopic. Actresses and their agents were reaching out to say they’d be perfect for “the lead role,” assuming the part was a portrayal of the Hollywood icon. So, Darabont retitled the movie adaptation to The Shawshank Redemption. Cutting Hayworth’s name from the title made it sleeker and also more understandable to audiences — but only slightly more so, as moviegoers still didn’t know what a Shawshank was at the time, hence its disappointing box office.