The Next Three Days and Shawshank Redemption

            The films Shawshank Redemption and The Next Three Days have very few commonalities and many differences.

            Though very rare, the commonalities in both films were relatively easy to spot.  For example, both films involve an innocent person who had been put in jail for supposedly killing someone they knew.  In Shawshank Redemption, Andy is incarcerated for the supposed murder of his wife and the man she was having a love affair with; however, in The Next Three Days, all evidence points to Lara killing her boss.  First she had a fight with the boss, then her fingerprints were on the murder weapon, and then she was seen driving away from the scene of the crime.  Another example of a commonality between the films is that they both involve escaping from jail.  In Shawshank Redemption, Andy escapes by himself, while in The Next Three Days, John comes up with the master plan to break his wife out of jail.  Another example is that both films look at the foul play that goes on when getting money.  Specifically, in Shawshank Redemption, Andy launders money for the warden even though before prison, he was an honest banker.  In The Next Three Days, John first gets mugged by some drug dealers, and then he mugs them back to obtain the “truck load” of money needed to stay afloat after breaking Lara out of prison.

            There were also many differences between the two films.  For example, the characters in both films dealt with a different reason for why the person broke out of jail.  In Shawshank Redemption, Andy wants to live life, and he wants to go to Mexico to start a very minor boat tour place.  In The Next Three Days, on the other hand, John wants his life to go back to how it was before Lara was arrested.  He wants his family to be whole and happy again.  Another difference between the films is that both films take place in different time periods and span over a different amount of years.  Shawshank Redemption takes place from the end of the 1940’s to the end of the 1960’s.  The Next Three Days takes place in modern day and spans over only about three years.  A main difference between the films is the character’s perspective.  In Shawshank Redemption, the perspective is from a prisoner’s point of view in jail.  In The Next Three Days, the point of view is from outside the jail, and the audience never knows what life is like for Lara inside the jail.

            Shawshank Redemption and The Next Three Days have a small amount of commonalities and quite a few differences.  They are both films about prison break.  However, both films are from a different point of view.

The Next Three Days

Is it possible to break your loved one out of prison, even in the modern era?  This is what the 2010 thriller film The Next Three Days aims to answer.  The film, directed by Paul Haggis, stars Russell Crowe and Elizabeth Banks and is a remake of a 2007 French film called Pour Elle.  It takes places in modern day and in two places: one of them being Pittsburgh, and the other is a surprise at the end. 

Everything is going great for John, Lara, and their son, George Brennan, when Lara is suddenly arrested for the murder of her boss.  The night before, Lara had gotten into an argument with her boss, and that same night, a co-worker walks into the parking lot to find the boss dead just as Lara is driving away.  All the evidence, fingerprints on the fire extinguisher, blood on the jacket, and driving away from the scene of the crime, undeniably points to Lara as the killer.  John cannot fathom the idea that his wife would ever do such a thing, and, since Lara’s final appeal has been rejected, he decides that the only thing left that he can do is to break her out of prison.  The problem is, though, that Lara will be transferred to another prison in the next three days.  John creates an elaborate plan and risks his life just to save his wife from jail.

Russell Crowe’s acting is amazing, and the film was quite suspenseful.  For example, there is a scene where Crowe’s character almost gets caught for using a bump key on the prison elevator, but he does not get in trouble.  Crowe’s character gets warned that one would not want a child to have two parents in jail, and upon realizing this harsh possibility, he rushes outside to vomit.  Crowe’s acting looked so realistic, like we are watching John’s reaction to the situation rather than an actor acting out the scene; moreover, the way Crowe stumbles from the nauseating fear that his character feels until he ultimately throws up and then picks himself up to move on makes the audience want to jump through the screen and comfort his character because we believe what we see.  An example of the suspense in the film is when a curly haired man visits John’s house after John has been beat up and mugged.  The audience is immediately unsure what the man’s intentions are; moreover, this builds tension in the audience because we fear that John may get mugged again or even shot.

The film had way too many characters.  An example of this is there is a lady doctor that see’s Lara’s blood work and says something like, “I have to be at the hospital with her.”  That is the only role that this doctor plays in the film, yet, we are introduced to her; furthermore, she seems to have no purpose in the film whatsoever, especially since she does not add to the story in any way.  Another example is Nicole, whose daughter is friends with John’s son, George.  At first, it seems like her character will be John’s new love interest, but as soon as she finds out that John’s wife is in jail, she plays no more role in the film aside from her daughter being friends with George.  Again, we are introduced to a new character who at first seems like she will add some conflict to the story because she could become the love interest; however, she also does not add to the story in any significant way, and the audience feels frustrated for investing emotionally in her.

Overall, I give The Next Three Days 3 out of 5 stars.  The film had a superfluous amount of characters that did not add to the story or added interest but then immediately became unimportant such as Nicole’s character.  The film did have its ups though, such as Russell Crowe’s acting that makes the audience believe he truly is John pining for his wife.