Gender
The title of the novel, from which the film is based, is titled: "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" but it was changed for the film. The fact that the original title of the story includes the name of a woman who isn't directly in the film, but impacts it, shows her importance.
The change in a title did not diminish the effect that Rita Hayworth had on Shawshank prison, or the men within it. They played her movie many times in the prison and she was a connection to not only the outside world for them, but a connection to women. She was beautiful and served as a distraction for the men from their regular, miserable prison lives. For Andy, she was even more.
Andy would use posters of women to cover up his growing hole in the wall, which was being built for escape. Rita Hayworth was the first poster he used to hide his plans and work. The women, and Rita, were sexually objects in the films and yet also symbols of escape and hope for Andy.
Andy's Wife
Andy Dufresne's sentence is due to the murder of his wife, and her lover. His life is ruined and scarred because of his wife's actions, as well as her death. If she had not been murdered in the midst of her affair, Andy would not have been framed and charged with the murder. This is not to say that she is to blame, but that he could easily find blame with her and her actions, however it is not a key theme in the film, nor is it explicitly expressed. But her portrayal is still not exactly a good one. She has no face, no name and no personality except that of an angry, ungrateful and unfaithful wife. The audience never sees her as any more than that and only know her through glimpses of her infidelity and through Andy's tellings of their unfaithful marriage. The following clip shows all that we know and really see of Andy's wife; showing how much she has negatively impacted Andy and yet, he loved her. She is practically a villain, more than she is a victim.
Women do not exist in the film as characters, only as plot devices. The posters help Andy hide his mode of escape and his wife put him in prison in the first place. The women are flat and one-dimensional, they play no role in the film except to move the plot along and add certain aspects to the main character's story. We briefly hear of two other women, the Warden's wife and the wife of a man who is doing business with the Warden; both of which only served the purpose of providing a sewn quote in the warden's office and a baked pie in which they hid bribe money. Both are examples of the film continuing to use women as nothing more than plot devices.
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