Good Will Hunting (1998)

What makes films great!

Character development at it's best. Written and on the screen. It draws audiences to see it and big name talent to be in it. November 2, 2008

Good will hunting by Brandon

I don't have to say how good this movie was. I could watch it all the time and never get tired of it. October 2, 2008

Inspirational and Entertaining Drama

After all these years, it's still hard to believe that Ben Affleck and Matt Damon wrote this screenplay. The Collector's Series edition has a commentary with Ben and Matt, where they talk about the genesis of the movie and how the screenplay changed from its inception to the final film cut. Every actor involved turns in brilliant performances--the casting of Robin Williams and Minnie Driver can't be overstated. "Good Will Hunting" is one inspirational drama that isn't sappy or ridiculously overwrought. August 18, 2008

Einstein, Shakespeare--and Who???

Will Hunting (Matt Damon) is an MIT janitor and mathematical genius with a major attachment and abuse reactive disorders (though the film doesn't identify the latter). After solving an "impossible" math problem Professor Gerald Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgard) chalked on the board outside his classroom, the goodly pedant attends Hunting's latest arraignment for fighting, and convinces a skeptical judge that he can salvage the boy's otherwise futile life.

After false starts with several "master" psychologists whom Hunting easily outwits, Lambeau approaches Sean McGuire (Robin Williams). Lambeau figures, who better to help the boy than his eclectic former college roommate, like Hunting a tough-skinned "Southie" (South Boston native)?

Thus begins Hunting's frequent forays into Cambridge to "study" with Lambeau and his mathematical colleagues, whom he usually humiliates by solving their toughest problems in the blink of an eye.

In one clever scene, Hunting takes his best friend Chuckie (Ben Affleck) and two other Southie sidekicks to a Cambridge bar. Chuckie tries to impress Harvard student Skylar (Minnie Driver). A self-satisfied graduate student prig interrupts, and tries embarrassing Chuck to captivate Skylar. That backfires when Hunting steps in. He has also apparently read and memorized every book ever written. The prig slinks away in shame. As Hunting and friends depart, Skylar approaches and hands him her number.

As another reviewer notes, Good Will Hunting is good and original--but where good, is not original and where original, is not good. I'd agree that the film nicely portrays lower class Boston Irish life, and the strange match between a high class orphan (and upper-class) Harvard woman and a brilliant street tough, whose early life was marred by constant physical abuse. The acting in general is very strong, with Robin Williams (as always) at the head of the class.

But the Matt Damon and Ben Affleck screenplay, while often fine and riveting, is also at times completely naïve. As young actors before this film gave them their first break, Damon and Affleck bought into ahistorical propaganda and never let go. Thus in one session with McGuire, Hunting again spews forth his mastery of great literature and science, but like an otherwise unread cultist ranks Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky with Shakespeare. Utterly ballsy---and too stupid.

If the math is inaccurate, so what. That's not a key point of this film.

But it is extremely unfortunate that the movie portrays a sudden breakthrough when Hunting finally gets down to talking to McGuire about the serial beatings he suffered as a child. Everyone even slightly familiar with psychological therapy knows this is genuinely incredible (as in not believable). Genius or not, no patient who experienced such major early life traumas could achieve such complete healing after only a few months of counseling. This might make pleasant fiction. But given the seriousness of the film's central theme, it dangerously suggests the impossible is possible and could give some viewers false hope.

--Alyssa A. Lappen July 25, 2008

Original and touching

Where do you start with such a wonderfully crafted story with an amazing cast.

A janitor (Matt Damon) at a college is discovered to be mathematically gifted by a highly acclaimed mathmetician at the college and is pressed to use his talent.

But Matt fights the approach because he's afraid of the unknown and doesn't want to leave his comfort zone of his friends, and unchallenging job. After fighting and kicking he finally gives in and slowly begins to break down his walls to experience the gift he has never used.

No one could have been better than Matt Damon. He takes the role on as if he truly was the character who was brought up in abusive foster homes and has built walls around his insecurities.

I loved to watch him. I believed him. And Minnie Driver as his girlfriend is captivating.

It's refreshing to see the very talented Robin Williams in a more serious role. July 25, 2008

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