I won't tire you with accolades! Just magnificently done. I will even confess to tears welling up in my eyes with Red's "hopeful" meditation: “I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope…”

I'm a minister, and in one of my sermons on...yes...hope, I spoke of this movie, including a scene you alluded to.

After being released from solitary after his stunt with the record player, he joins his friends in the cafeteria. They wonder how he made it.

He says to them, “That’s the beauty of music. They can’t get that from you. Haven’t you ever felt that way about music?”

Red replies, “I played a mean harmonica as a younger man. Lost interest in it though. Didn’t make much sense in here.”

Andy pursues the dialogue. “Here’s where it makes the most sense. You need it so you don’t forget.”

“Forget?”

“Forget that… there are places in this world that aren’t made out of stone. That there’s something inside… that they can’t get to, that they can’t touch. That’s yours.”

“What’re you talking about?”

“Hope.”

“Hope? Let me tell you something, my friend,” he says while wagging his spoon at him. “Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane. It’s got no use on the inside. [That is, prison.] You’d better get used to that idea.”

There's a hint of existentialism with Brooks, after being granted parole, "stares into his future, the dizzying effect of freedom causes him to topple."

Thanks for reminding me of a movie I once heard described as “a romantic movie for dudes."