This is how long Andy’s tunnel was in The Shawshank Redemption
Somebody finally did the maths, so you can find out exactly how much human waste he crawled through for his freedom
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Crawling through a river of human waste is distinctly unpleasant for any amount of distance; yet if you ever wondered exactly how much human waste the wrongly accused Andry Dufresne (Tim Robbins) crawled through to escape his cell in The Shawshank Redemption, your time has come. Somebody actually did the maths.
NYC graphic designer Shahed Syed, aka dehahs, has beautifully presented the calculated distances in his infographic piece The Shawshank Computation. His self-imposed goal: "Starting in the second year of his life sentence, it took Andy Dufresne nearly 17 years to tunnel his way to freedom. But just how long was the tunnel that Andy dug out? Let’s find out with known dimensions and the power of mathematics."
The graphic not only proposes the tunnel's length, but also charts out the timeline of Dufresne's 17 year-long dig. Knowing that the character, as the film states, began his tunnel in 1949; Syed utilised the various pin-up posters glimpsed in his cell as a mark of the passage of time: from Rita Hayworth (1949) to Marilyn Monroe (1957) to Raquel Welch (1966).
That's a total progress of 1/64th of an inch every day for 16.9 years. Working towards a grand total of 10 feet. Now try and think of the last time you showed that much commitment to anything in your life.
The 1994 Stephen King adaptation has become a widely-regarded triumph of cinema precisely for its tale of humanity's will to overcome; of one innocent man's determined journey to find his own truth, freedom, and justice. It currently sits at the top of IMDB's Top 250 list, though it lost the 1995 Academy Award for Best Picture to another favourite, Forrest Gump.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments