The book is always better than the movie, at least in my humble opinion. What a book can do in as many pages as the author desires, a movie must congest into a few, short hours, so the chapters are edited to work around the time constriction. There are numerous differences between the novella and the movie, but this paper will only talk about two: the disappearance of Tommy Williams and the ending of the story. I will also discuss what is similar between the two portrayals, namely Andy doing the tax write off for Hadley and what he asks for in return. The first difference is how Tommy was removed from the rest of the story. In the book, Mr. Williams was given a lessened sentence and transferred to a different facility to keep him quiet about a man named Elwood Blatch, supposedly the true murderer of Andy’s wife and her lover. However, in the movie Tommy is shot multiple times after telling the warden he would vouch for Andy’s innocence. Either way Tommy, who was Andy’s only chance at getting out legally, was removed from the story. This was a devastating blow to Andy and even though the man managed to recover, he had to resort to other means of getting out of Shawshank. This change was most likely done to make the warden come off as even worse of a person and to add a more …show more content…
In the book, it simply ends with Red eagerly awaiting the journey to get to where Andy awaits. On the other hand, the movie shows the two actually reuniting, even embracing when meeting again beside the Pacific Ocean. Again, this change was made for a reason, but this time I believe it was to give better closure to the tale. If someone hadn’t read the beauty that is the novella, the ending might come off as lame or unresolved if it had simply ended with Morgan Freeman saying “I hope” and being done. This ending gives the viewer a happier conclusion rather than leaving off and allowing for one to draw their own wrap up to the