Good Will Hunting (Miramax Collector's Series) Reviews

• A drama with emotional depth

  
  By A23GFTVIETX7DS on 2004-06-18
  This quiet drama about what genius means was the surprise hit of 1997, with friends Matt Damon and Ben Affleck both collaborating on the screenplay and acting. Damon plays Will Hunting, a troubled, gruff young man who works as a janitor at MIT despite his incredible self-education and intelligence. When a mathematics professor discovers that Will has solved a complicated problem left on the blackboard, he pursues Will as a potential protégé. But Will is not good with authority figures, as his past includes abuse at the hands of his father. When Will lands in jail, however, and the professor manages to obtain his release with the stipulation that Will work on mathematics with him and see a counselor, Will's whole life begins to open up. As a patient of psychologist Sean Maguire (Robin Williams), Will forges a relationship that acts as a catalyst for a new future.

  Matt Damon does a wonderful job with the title role, although at times he seems a little wooden. As the therapist with a painful history that Will eventually connects with, Robin Williams turns in one of his less flamboyant performances. His suffering is palpable, and his need to save Will from himself lends real passion to the film. Affleck provides solid balance as Will's friend Chuckie, although his performance is less memorable than the other two, more of a function of the role than the actor. Minnie Driver is charming and believable as Will's new girlfriend Skylar.

  The screenplay is intelligent and skillfully developed despite some unbelievable facets of the premise, most notably that such a wounded individual, no matter how bright, would have the discipline to teach himself as much as Will knows. Still, this movie only gets better as it progresses. The relationship between Will and his therapist is dynamic, poignant, and meaningful.

  This is a good film to own, as it uncovers additional subtleties on second viewing, as long as you don't mind revisiting emotional angst. Its feel-good story arc is somewhat predictable, but the dialogue and interactions are not, making this flick surprisingly complex given the young ages of Damon and Affleck when it was made.
  
  

• Good film crafting

  
  By AK6UVFSU07NXH on 2000-05-08
  There were few films in 1997 that enjoyed more publicity than Good Will Hunting. Most of the hype centered on the two tyro actors who penned the screenplay. It seems that they had been friends for years and in between college obligations, drinking and socialising, they had been toying with a script on the side. What started out as a rather average comedy, soon evolved into a sophisticated drama. In fact, it could hardly avoid getting better as Matt Damon and Ben Affleck must have received a ton of brutal criticism from every Hollywood executive that they approached.
  
  The true miracle is not that two actors, unknown for writing, could get a script accepted in Hollywood but that the script was so good that it put every other effort for the year in the shade. In my opinion, the motion picture academy was correct in awarding the Oscar for best screenplay to Good Will Hunting. Everything about the script suggested writers with a profound understanding of the human condition; even now I half suspect there was an element of that old saying about an infinite number of monkeys on typewriters.
  
  For those interested in this Cinderella story within a movie, you should listen to the director's track on the DVD. It offers a unique insight into the background of the writing and filming of Good Will Hunting. It becomes clear from Ben and Matt's reminiscences that they had a ball during every part of the process. Not only that, they took advantage of their opportunity, to offer support roles to friends and family; a situation that rarely occurs outside of independent film. Surprisingly, one of the best support performances was produced by Casey Affleck, who is Ben's cousin, (I think).
  
  The script took a bit of a risk by making the main character a super-genius. Not only is it difficult to portray a person with such talents but it is nearly impossible to do so while making him likeable. After all, the tall poppy syndrome is strongest when it comes to intellect. We can all aspire to wealth and with plastic surgery, even beauty is not unattainable but the brains you are born with is the most you're ever going to have. However, Matt Damon proved me wrong on both counts.
  
  Will Hunting was undeniably bright. The scene in the Harvard bar were he takes on an educational supremacist is worth watching again and again just for the superb timing that was employed. Will also manages to win our sympathy despite his I.Q. Not so much because he acts like "one of the boys" but because we discover early on that for every blessing he received in the brain department, he was given a matching curse in his life. An orphan who was raised by a series of abusing foster parents is unlikely to have much room left for pride.
  
  The catalyst which helps Will break out of his life is Gerald Lambeau, (Stellan Skarsgård). He is an award winning mathematician and professor at MIT where Will works as a janitor. Their paths cross when Will off-handedly solves a difficult maths problem which Lambeau had set for his post graduate class. But whilst there relationship is important, it is little more than a subplot; a segue toward Will's eventual meeting with Sean Maguire, a psychiatrist played by Robin Williams.
  
  Sean is invited by Lambeau to work with Will. The two are old friends but even so, Sean was only approached after four other therapists had been run off by Will's destructive insights and bitter insults. Sean is a bird of a different feather however. He shares a common background with Will, and if anything, he has had more pain in his life than Will may ever see. In a strange way, Sean becomes Will's mother to Lambeau's role as ambitious father.
  
  The film is rich with detail and is a wonderful medium for the support actors. Ben Affleck's role as Will's best friend is not as visible as Matt Damon's but he carries it off with just the right amount of fatalism and aggression. Will's Lady friend Skylar, is also worth special mention. Minnie Driver takes a seemingly token "love interest" role and breaths real depth into it. Without her efforts, Will's final choice would not have rung true and might have marred the whole film.
  
  Good Will Hunting is a tribute to the dreams of American youth. Both because two young men managed to reach the pinnacle of their craft on their first outing but more importantly, because it deals with one young man's struggle to overcome his troublesome past while reaching out to grasp life, love and happiness. It's touching, entertaining and at the same time inspirational.
  
  

• Good Will Hunting >>FAILS<< to be genuine.

  
  By A1HMMJCXEKLDZX on 1999-12-05
  I have problems enjoying this movie. In fact I hated it. That is why it troubles me to see so many good reviews. Because of the word limitation I will not be able to clearly elucidate all my dislikes for this movie.

  but, here goes...

  1. The story line is trite and predictable.

  2. Though the story line is unoriginal, we see Will admonishing a Harvard student for being unoriginal.

  3. Using Howard Zinn's 'A People's History of United States' as a source for history is puzzling at best. If anyone has read this book, one will find obvious one-sided arguments that one can figure out in just the language *itself* without knowing any history. Zinn admits to its one sidedness and gives his reasons. Did the writers actually read this book?

  4. The depiction of Will Hunting as a mathematical genius the likes of Ramanujan without any effort is a joke. Ramanujan, Gauss, Archimedes, Newton, Mozart, Bach, Durer, da Vinci, and every genius put enormous efforts in their works and have thus been called geniuses.

  5. If Will is such a great genius, then why couldn't the audience see his works? Could it have been as deep as the Fundamental Theorem of Algebra, or insightful as Euler's discovery of e? Or as profound as the discovery/invention of non-euclidean geometry? If Will was on par as the disoverers of these mathematical ideas, then how can you separate the man from his brilliant mind?

  6. The development of the relationships in this movie is best described as being 'convenient'. That is to say, there is no development. I had the impression that the writers have not lived enough to flesh any details in this department. In fact, I could not ignore this thought; that is why it was no surprise to me that the parents of Will's girlfriend were killed in a fire. This way, the writers could 'conveniently' avoid fleshing this detail.

  7. Contrived psychotherapy. Repeated saying that 'it not your fault' can actually help? This is almost as far fetched as Will being a math genius.

  8. Science is a hard subject. What a slap in the face of the practiioners of science to treat mathematics and Organic Chemistry as trivial.

  9. Will is a smart boy, but he's a baaad boy. Is this every girls' dream? An exciting 'dangerous' man but can fill her curiousity about Boltzmann's statistical mechanics. Now only if Will could develop his psychic and telekinetic skills, then I'd be really impressed! It makes you wonder about Damon who insisted he play the part of this dreamboat.

  10. I don't see this movie as an accurate portrayal of Boston. If so, I'd think I'd move back to New York.

  11. 'But I love you scene' was so terribly funny. Will goes out with a girl for a few dates and now she is in love with him. Is this realistic? A girl falls in love with a foul mouth janitor? It is hard to suspend my disbelief for a movie that presents itself as serious.

  Perhaps that's my problem? I take this movie too seriously. Maybe this movie is suppose to horribly bad like a cheesy horror flick. I'm suppose to laugh at the unrealism as I would someone getting his head chopped off?

  How can I address the great love people have for a movie I hated? I've talked to those in Boston who have liked this movie and the answers were rather disappointing: 'I like the shots of the T (subway)' 'It was neat to see Boston on the movie screen.'

  Finally, I came to an answer that I could accept. When I asked a thoughtful person why he liked it, he told me that the movie sucked, but he felt an emotional attachment to Will.

  So maybe, just maybe, the acting was not so bad.
  
  

• "What's with everyone saying that I owe it to myself?

  
  By A3U56M0Y8LYO6J on 2003-03-11
  Genius is a fleeting thing. As Gus Van Sant's "Good Will Hunting" shows, one can dedicate his entire life to mastering an academic discipline . . . only to be one-upped by the janitor. Matt Damon made his cinematic break-through portraying Will Hunting, the MIT janitor who is a master of mathematics but a basket case in the more personal aspects of life. He is the janitor at MIT who catches the eye of Professor Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgard) who sees the unlimited potential in Hunting even if Hunting himself can't see it. Yet, the trauma of Hunting's life has taken its toll on the boy and Lambeau hopes counseling by his old college roommate, Sean McGuire (Robin Williams) can help undo the psychological damage. Supported by Skylar (Minnie Driver), a Harvard student, and his best friend Chuckie (Ben Affleck), Hunting begins to make strides and come to grips with his past.

  "Good Will Hunting" basically came out of nowhere in 1997 and captured the imagination of the viewing public. It was a reminder that solid films could still be made without $100 million budgets. It was also the film that made both Damon and Affleck household names, won Robin Williams his first Oscar, and gave director Gus Van Sant (of "Drugstore Cowboy" and "To Die For" fame) his first major commercial success. It was a straightforward character study fueled by strong individual performances and clever dialogue which emulated films of an earlier era that reveled in its simplicity and not its bombast. "Good Will Hunting" will never be mistaken for a Hollywood epic but it still endears as a little cinematic gem from the 1990's.
  
  

• Four for the movie, Five for the DVD

  
  By A10Y596I3SL84S on 2000-03-30
  The angry one star reviews for Good Will Hunting demean the legitimacy of the angry one star reviews for films such as Titanic, which are truly terrible. Good Will Hunting is not a lavish hollywood blockbuster that cost 70 million to make and trippled that at the box office. It did well and garnered critical praise but it's still a (relatively) art house film handled well by Van Sant who has constructed good, small, location and lifestyle specific American movies.

  This movie is the same. I actually agree with some of the legitimate criticism that this movie is predictable and over wound up at the end. The other criticism about how Will shouldn't be a genius and that the film is generally "trite" seems like silly prejudice.

  Take my perspective... I'm a young writer of screenplays and saw the silly looking trailers for this movie written by two young guys. I was sort of furious on the inside that these two were being lauded as great and I've never seen a Robin Williams movie that wasn't over sentimental trash. Then I go to the Angelica in New York, fuming and ready to hate this movie. But I couldn't... it was too well done, well acted by all three of my nemesis and genuinely funny and emotional. Those below who say that Matt Damon's performance is bad are one of two things - without any clue about acting or jealous (and stupid because honestly I'm jealous yet I think he was great).

  In addition, the features here are definately good for a couple of days watching and paint a vivid picture of how this film came to be.
  
  

• By day he installs urinal cakes, by night he solves problems
  By A1Y67BEMZMU7SD on 2006-01-04
  Good Will Hunting has some problems. He's from the wrong side of the tracks, has a brother who dresses like a Bulgarian pimp and despite being a genius, has to sustain himself by perfoming menial jobs at a posh Boston college.
  
  In between changing urinal cakes and scrubbing toilets clean he beats up people with his brothers, humiliates caricature Harvard grads, woos babes and solves difficult math problems left on the boards by math professors. Once he is discovered as the boy genius who solves math problems, he is taken under the math professor's wings who realizes Will has an anti-social streak in him and promptly turns him over to psychologist Robin Williams who is still getting over the death of his wife.
  
  As you can probably predict, the genius and the psychologist have their battle of wits and an unlikely friendship develops. Will the analyst get through to Will? Will Will leave his friends behind and embrace a life of academic pursuits? Will there be any doubt in your mind that this is formulaic and stilted? Not if you have a brain it won't.
  
  This movie comes to you courtesy of Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and the guy who thought it would be a good idea to remake "Psycho".
  
  Enough said.
  
  
• Good Will not enough talent
  By on 2000-05-14
  Mr Will Hunting has it all.

  He's a genius. He has an eidetic memory. He can beat up people. He's a fast talker that can out duel a Harvard student. He's charming. He can woo women. He knows more math than Gauss, Euler, Poincare, Hilbert, and Ramanujan combined.

  He is the modern day Leonardo Da Vinci for academians and for women's hearts.

  But, how can we, the average schmoes, take this movie seriously, when Mr Will Hunting cannot bend spoons? C'mon writers! What a glaring omission!

  Clearly a character this talented deserves to have telekinetic powers!

  For more entertainment and >>realism<<, I recommend watching old episodes of MacGyver or the Pretender.
  
  

• Forever A Classic In My Eyes
  By A20S1G4ETKNYB on 2001-12-16
  I've watched this movie more than any other in my collection and am awestricken every time. Profound acting, immaculate cinematography, and undeniably brilliant dialogue leaves me with only one word to describe the film - incredible.

  Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, the screenwriters for Good Will Hunting, are clearly WAY beyond their respective years in wisdom and perceptiveness. They wrote a story that I consider to be one of the most insightful and thought-provoking ever told.

  Robin Williams also helped out immensely with his acting role, quite often putting a grin on your face with his witty dialogue, then, seconds later, abruptly slapping that grin away with heartfelt earnesty.

  Minnie Driver played an excellent part as well, giving the audience a veritable view of what it feels like be in love with someone who doesn't love you back.

  In conclusion, if you want a flick that makes you think, laugh, and cry all at once, then do yourself a favor and BUY THIS MOVIE!

  And to all the holy whiners: Yes, there are a fair amount of cuss words in the film, but c'mon: Pay a visit to reality land, will ya'? I definitely do NOT expect four ruffians from South Boston to say "golly gee" all the time, do you? I'm sorry if it hurts your little virgin ears, but "Good Will Hunting" is a true-to-life movie, and the vulgarity that you so despise simply adds to the genuineness of the story. So HOW DO YA LIKE THEM APPLES?!
  
  

• One Of The Best Contemporary Dramas Available!
  By ALR35EFI69S5R on 2002-07-14
  This movie goes off the charts in all the most important ways, in terms of storyline, ensemble acting presented, contemporary humor, revealing truths about life and the problems associated with a young, brilliant, but emotionally troubled young man trying desperately to make sense out of a crazy world. What is so amazing and so remarkable about the film is that it was the handywork and dreamchild of two relatively unknown (at least up until then) actors and screenwriters in the persons of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, boyhood friends and denizens of the greater Boston area.

  Add to this superb screenplay the support of wonderful actors like Robin Williams, who won a best supporting actor oscar for his role as the psychiatrist who unlocks the secrets to the protagonist (Will Hunting)and allows him to grow and mature. Minnie Driver is also excellent as the love interest drawing Will Hunting toward his beckoning adulthood. She is also the occasion for the single best line in the film; "You like apples? I got her phone number! How do you like them apples?" This film works so well on so many levels that it is really a shame that it lost the Oscar for best picture to "Shakespeare In Love", for this is a far more powerful, enduring, and worthwhile film experience. if you haven't seen it, I recommend you RUN to the nearest video store and rent it. And after you swoon before its magic, you'll want to come back to Amazon.com and order a copy for your personal video library. Enjoy!
  
  

• .
  By on 2000-01-08
  Some of the bitingly negative reviews of this movie are pretty amusing, and I should point out that most of the criticisms are, in fact, highly valid. As Leonard says above, this is not a movie that bears close scrutiny. It's all too easy to envision Ben Affleck and Matt Damon giggling over beers and a notebook as they concocted a pseudo-intellectual "moving" screenplay (which they probably figured the academy would love) in which Matt Damon gets to play a young, masculine super-genius and occasionally go on scathingly, cynically profound rants, boldly break a girl's heart, and kick some ass in between before learning a valuable moral lesson from that fuzzy personification of Chicken Soup for the Soul, Robin Williams. An interesting thing to speculate on is how self-aware the two were of exactly what they were putting together and why. And while some of Van Sant's direction is interesting, if inexplicable (I love the way Matt Damon's face glows with a strange angelic light as he looks at Williams' painting in his office), he is a director I have yet to find myself in admiration of. Still, with these things said, I have to admit I enjoyed the movie quite a bit, primarily because the performances are strong, and because Will Hunting is fundamentally a fascinating character, despite all the egotism evident behind his creation (or maybe, in part, even because of it.) He is so representative of the elations and dilemmas of male psychology (this may not be entirely intentional), and if one isn't too busy being put off by the film's shortcomings, he embodies a number of very philosophical conflicts (existential thoughts and values vs. sup-of-life romanticism, say.) It's actually a pity to see the sappy romanticism win out, but if it didn't, it probably wouldn't have been up for an Oscar, and almost no one would like it. Anyhow, all of this isn't handled in the most insightful way, perhaps, but the strength of the performances, which I've already mentioned, and one or two genuinely intelligent exchanges, help pull it together.

  What it really comes down to, I think, is whether or not you can get into the Will Hunting character. If you can suspend disbelief for his sake and be engaged by his problems, dilemmas, and attitude, you'll get something out of this. Others who might enjoy it are girls who are all squishy for Matt Damon and anyone who thinks Robin Williams is just too darn heart-warming for his own good (though he is at least sort of frumpy and watered down here -- to his and Van Sant's credit.)
  
  

• Yuck...
  By A1P9OG16O6FJT0 on 2000-03-06
  Hollywood hype wins out again...somehow convincing millions that this is a great movie. Honestly, my husband and I sat there, astonished at how predictable this film was. Worthy of academy awards? My cats could roll better film in their litterbox! There's not much to say about it, as there's not much to it. A very basic story line that may seem compelling to a young child, but not suited for children as the language can be kind of harsh. This film is definately worthy of neither all the awards it received, nor of all the hype. Go outside and play a game of touch football, you'll have better spent your time.
  
  
• GRITTY, STIRRING, THOUGHT-PROVOKING DRAMA
  By A1L8HRCM60W0W7 on 2004-05-09
  As close as a film comes to thrilling, moving, complete entertainment.

  The taut screenplay keeps you riveted as events unfold. Despite it's straightforward thematic backbone, Good Will Hunting does an impressive job playing out complex emotional negotiations between lover and friend, eager professional mentor and unwilling father figure, with the bitterness any hardworking career academic like the professor must inevitably feel in the face of a genetic miracle who'd rather chase girls than gunk around with theorems and formulas.

  On the negative side, some characters may come across as cardboard (an arrogant MIT professor; a humble-by-choice psychologist who turns out to be The Most Effective; an unsung math prodigy from the wrong side of Boston who never really saw the face of school but can recite page numbers from economics books; etc) but all of it is executed with such magnificent grace, style and heartfelt emotional realism that it has moved me every single time I have watched it (5 times).

  Special mention for the fabulous cameos from Robin Williams in a rare subdued but effective performance sans his usual comedic histrionics, and Minnie Driver, who is simply stunning in her role as Mr. Precocious' love interest.

  The DVD has some neat special features including interviews with the director and some interesting outtakes. This one's a keeper.
  
  

• He Cleans Urinals/He Does Math!
  By ACVLLA37BN9KY on 2004-08-09
  When juvenile delinquent janitor Will Hunting (Damon) is not busy changing the sanitary cakes in the urinals or cleaning up vomit, he solves complex multinomial equations in his head and reads unabridged history books. He can stand head-to-head in intellectual debates with Harvard graduate students, and then booze it up and street fight with his low-life Southy buddies. Then, when there's crime occuring nearby, he goes into a telephone booth and...ooh...wait...wrong guy...
  
  This movie should have been labeled as a comedy, as there is very little here that will fail to make you laugh. Or better yet, science fiction, because it pushes the outer limits of absurdity with an ill-concieved plotline that involves a college janitor who is intellectually gifted (?), but has never realized his potential. A college professor discovers Hunting's talent for solving complex equations and tries to reform him through psychoanalysis.
  
  Good Will Hunting fails to impress on three levels. First, the plot is utterly unbelieveable. Second, the dialogue is very abrasive to anyone with a post-secondary degree. And finally, the two main characters (Williams and Damon)in the movie are unlikable. No big bash here on Affleck or Damon, I think they're both good actors (especially Damon), but as screenwriters, the two are a joke.
  
  With regard to the first and second points (on the plot and dialouge that is), I am sure that there are possibly a few people out there in the real world gifted with exceptionally high IQs and, because of circumstances beyond thier control, are relgated to doing menial labor. On a similar note, there are probably a few people out there with low IQs who are fortunate enough to hold high ranking positions in society, such as some political officals (ahem).
  
  However, it is inconcievable for any human being to *naturally* grasp concepts in subjects such as History, Economics, Statistics, Psychology and Organic Chemistry without the benefit of caring tutilidge. It is hard enough to master any one of these subjects, let alone all, as Hunting seemingly does. This aspect of the plot will cause anyone with a Bachelor's Degree or higher to want to hurl rubber bricks at the television set. I believe that it was Einstien who said that: "genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" (or was that Weird Al Yankovic?). No matter.
  
  And herein lies the difference between good screenwriting and bad. Any story about a downtrodden and orphaned janitor trying to educate himself against all odds could have been a winner, if it were played out as a realistic production. Why did Affleck and Damon *need* to play upon adolescent fantasy and make Hunting the second coming of the Messiah? Good drama does not require such sensationalism.
  
  With regard to the third point, both Hunting and the Williams' characters are unlikable. Hunting, is a pariah "know-it-all" with a chip on his shoulder who delights in showing up psychologists up for his own amusement. While Damon does a good job of acting the part, I had no feeling or sympathy for his character. Specifically, I think that it would be very unlikely that anyone with such a high level of intellectual and cultural awareness would be such a callous social retard. (For Pete's Sake buddy, what part of: "You're going to jail if you don't humor the shrinks!" does this supposed genius not understand?!) Even Forrest Gump would probably agree that a protagonist in any movie should have some redeeming qualities.
  
  Williams, on the other hand, sucks eggs and is one-dimensional. He plays the same damn character in every movie he's been in since Good Morning Vietnam. He's become a fixture as the "lovable, sensitive and funny" guy and it's getting old. They always give him the role that is supposed to make you feel sorry for him and cry. In this movie, he's the widower psychologist and the only guy who can relate to Will Hunting because he's from the same upbringing. How utterly cliche! Can I have an Oscar too?
  
  
• Deep Hurting!
  By A15ATK6RNJC574 on 2000-04-16
  If this movie had a point besides a Matt Damon and Ben Affect ego-trip,could somone please explain it to me!They write the script so they get to star in it! I felt ready to for the movie to kill off both of them just to end this abomination.The jokes were unoriginal and were very boring and unfunny.Just watching the charecters act and spout terrible diologe almost put me into a coma and left me emotionally numb for several hours after watching it.Oh,and the gentle opening scene with the tender music and faceted shots could almost fool me into thinking this could be a good movie instead of the moldy flith that is this movie!
  
  
• Rubbish
  By AEWT0HFAGR15G on 2000-07-03
  That this piece of trash won any awards at all says a great deal about the awards themselves. From what I have heard this movie was written by a couple of college students. That is not surprising because it seems like it was written by a couple of drunken college students. It was predictable, inane, stupid, boring and just downright awful. The acting was attrocious with the exception of Robin Williams, who put forth one of his most believable performances ever. My favorite bad line was (quoted from memory) "Do you like apples? Well, I got her number how do you like those apples." What tripe. What rubbish. If wasting celluloid was a crime then this movie would be criminal. Please, don't waste your time watching this film. Life is too valuable. Spend your time more fruitfully: clip your nails, clean your kitchen, even watch reruns of the Brady Bunch.
  
  
• It's a Boston thing!
  By on 2000-07-12
  All of you people need to live ina Boston neighborhood for a while and you will realize why the script was written as it was. With the exception of Williams, the accents and the bad language were very accurate. Sorry, but I was born and raised in Boston and thats reality in the Blue collar Irish Catholic areas(Southie is not the only one either!). And that guy talking about the lack of blacks in the movie is clueless. That's the way Boston is, its a very segregated city, you didn't see many blacks? Hello, the movies about Southie! If it was about Roxbury, you wouldn't see many whites! It was a bit to Hollywood and polished, not as gritty and real "Boston" as "Monument Ave." or the movie "Southie" but it is far deeper and better acted than those movies. Anyway, its a quality film so give it a chance and if you've never hung out on the corner in Boston then don't be so quick to judge the swearing and the behavior cuz it IS realistic, believe it or not. Casey Affleck is hands down the most accurate portrail of a kid from the neighborhood right down to his outfit and scally cap. See this movie- The Rozzie Rat
  
  
• Essential hollywood product
  By A3HJQ0HMLPCPIR on 2002-07-26
  The most overrated movie in years. Contrived, shamelessly sentimental, and above all cliche-ridden. The perfect example as to why you should take Amazon.com's "Essential" label with a grain of salt. (Van Sant's "Drugstore Cowboy" is much better than this dreck.) If you think this has "emotional depth," you probably find "Hee-Haw" enthralling.
  
  
• Totally involving, original, wise and deeply moving.
  By A17FLA8HQOFVIG on 2004-05-28
  So many people I respect loved this film that I just had to see it. And I was glad I did. It surprised me. I had seen the trailer a long time ago and thought that the trailer had said it all. I was wrong. This film is a lot more than the plot. It is the story of a brilliant rough working class young man in from South Boston (Matt Damon) who retains everything he reads. He's a janitor at MIT and solves mathematical problems on the blackboard after class. He gets into a lot of fights and when he is arrested the mathematics professor who realizes what a genius he is, puts up bail on the proviso he get counseling with psychologist Robin Williams. What follows is a original, tight, and deeply moving movie. There is more wisdom in this one movie than I have ever seen on the screen before, and it is totally involving.

  I understand that before Matt Damon was an actor, he wrote this story as a 50 page assignment for a creative writing class at Harvard. The story haunted him, however, and with his friend, fellow actor Ben Affleck, they created the screenplay by improvising each scene together. What resulted was this work of art. Don't miss it!
  
  

• Egregious
  By AKE38QA95BJBJ on 1999-12-04
  I've recently struck up a mini-conversation with friends about the crummy director Gus Van Sant. Well, tonight I did something I almost never do: I walked out of a movie that was still playing. I sat through 75 minutes of _Good Will Hunting_, my suffering steadily increasing, till I found I could take no more, and left. I already had a VERY bad premonition when the opening credits included the following: WRITTEN BY MATT DAMON AND BEN AFFLECK As I read this, I swore under my breath. What can you expect of a movie written by two so-called handsome young actors, and directed by the inept Van Sant? A disaster. And disaster we got. I don't think _Good Will Hunting_ manages to depict truthfully, or entertainingly, ANYthing that it has made its subject. Nevertheless, I'd like to remark that *IF* the atmosphere at M. I. T. and Harvard is in any way similar to what we got to see in this movie, I pray I'll never get to visit those and similar places, and will never have to deal with people educated in those and similar establishments. 8-) The biggest shortcoming of _Good Will Hunting_ is its total LACK OF BEAUTY. But there's no art without beauty. Last night I saw another recent American movie that has been enjoying the reputation of a masterpiece here in Europe: Tony Kaye's _American History X_. It IS a masterpiece -- gripping, affecting from the first minute to the last. (The cast, including Hollywood legends in supporting roles, is uniformly superb, but Edward Norton tops them all.) Kaye's is a BRUTAL, VIOLENT, OBSCENE movie -- but, at the same time, it manages to be BEAUTIFUL, not only in certain moments but consistently. By contrast, in the supposedly feel-good movie _Good Will Hunting_ what we get in place of beauty are daft cliches spoken by an absurdly solemn-faced Robin Williams; these shots alternate with close-ups of Matt Damon's mug, who pretends to be affected to tears by what Williams has to say -- after all, Damon CO-WROTE Williams' lines (and this shows unfavorably throughout). Just as the authors of the movie wanted to make us believe that Will Hunting was a genius, it must have been immediately obvious to the viewers that the SCREENWRITERS of this movie were the opposites of geniuses: blundering dilettantes of the worst sort. I'm no Robin Williams fan, but I thought he was considered to be one of the greatest American actors of his generation. Why does he DEBASE HIMSELF like this? Is he *that* short of money? How could he ever say yes to a trite screenplay written by a pair of obviously immature, dabbling, amateurish screenwriters and fellow actors who could have been his sons? I've no idea who Matt Damon is and I don't care. But it was pitiful to see Ben Affleck in this disaster and, above all, to learn that he co-wrote it. Don't know about you guys, but has any of you ever seen a MERCUTIO that was as PERFECT, thrilling to watch, as Ben Affleck was in _Shakespeare in Love_? Ah, but there he was declaiming lines written by Tom Stoppard, not his own!
  
  
• Two scenes elevate this movie from simply good, to brilliant
  By ACX452WYX6G5O on 2004-05-27
  Many reviewers have focused on the acting and the story as the basis for their positive reviews, but there are two scenes that really make this movie, although I think the subtlety of their connection sometimes escapes people. Even Amazon's reviewer called the script "clunky" or some such condescending insult, making me think he missed this too.

  SPOILER

  The first scene occurs when Will Hunting and his posse go out on the town one night, and instead of going to their regular Southie hangouts, they hit a "Hahvahd bah". After a series of amusing events, there is a confrontation between Will and an arrogant Harvard undergrad, Clark. Clark, assuming Will is just some uneducated Southie scum, starts quoting from one of his history/economics textbooks, passing it off as his own thoughts, assuming that no one will recognize the true source of his words, in an attempt to impress some nearby girls. Will, having read the same book in his free time, recognizes the passage, interrupts, and finishes it for Clark, even quoting the book title, author, and page number, and thoroughly embarrassing Clark. Will asks, "are you going to plagiarize the entire book for me, or do you have an original thought of your own?" The humiliated student resorts to the lame comeback that at least he'll "have a degree, and Will will one day be serving his kids fries at the drive-through." Will responds, "at least I won't be unoriginal," and invites Clark to step outside to further "discuss" it. Clark meekly declines, ending the scene.

  The second scene occurs after Will has been recognized and bailed out from jail by an MIT professor, Lambeau. Lambeau's two conditions for bailing out Will were that Will spend several days a week working on mathematics with Lambeau, and working in therapy with a psychologist. However, Will inevitably proves smarter than all the psychologists Lambeau enlists, finding various ways to turn the tables and expose their own shortcomings and insecurities, rather than opening up about and dealing with his own, offending them and humiliating them to the point where they refuse to continue working with Will. Finally, Lambeau enlists the aid of Sean (Robin Williams), his old MIT undergrad roomate with whom he has fallen out of touch over the years. Sean, a Southie native like Will, is psychology prof at a local Boston college, and is a man living an empty, dead life, still grieving over the death of his beloved wife to cancer two years ago. In short order, Will cruelly exposes Sean's pain, and believing himself to be the victor once again, exits the session. But Sean is no quitter, and tells Lambeau to schedule the next session anyway. At this session, Sean turns the tables, by telling Will essentially what Will told the arrogant Harvard student at the bar, but on a deeper level. Sean tells Will that he's just boy, whose only experience in life comes from reading books. Sean points out that while Will may be able to talk all about art, war, love, grief, and other aspects of life, he's never actually experienced any of it. He doesn't know what it "smells like inside the Sistine Chapel", or what it's like to be in a war and to hold "your best friend's head in your lap and watch him draw his last breath, looking to you for help." Will doesn't know what it's like to truly love, nor to grieve for the death that of love. This revelation has the effect of instilling in Will a respect for Sean's intelligence and character, allowing him to finally start opening up to someone, and marking a turning point in the movie.

  Robin William's monologue in this scene is probably one of the best pieces of writing Hollywood has come up with in recent years, not for its sappiness, but for its depth, truth, and honesty, and for the clever way that it turns Will's own thoughts against him.

  So, for these two scenes alone I give this movie 5 stars. There are plenty of other funny and clever scenes that fill the gaps and complete the movie, but these are the most important two, and the ones that make it a must-see.
  
  

• Juvenile nonsense
  By on 1999-10-27
  This movie really deserves 0 stars. Whoever wrote the screenplay obviously knew nothing about mathematics and mathematicians. Damon's character is supposed to be a mathematical genius, yet it seems like he doesn't really know any mathematics and is just faking it. I doubt whether Hollywood filmmakers have the maturity to make a movie about a mathematical genius that is realistic and honest.
  
  
• frat boys in love
  By on 1999-09-23
  two rich kid frat boy actors(Ben Affleck and Matt Damon) write a script. it starts out as a spy thriller. then a studio buys it and brings in lots of high paid script doctors (WIlliam Goldman, etc) who essentially re-write the script only keeping the fratboy jokes entact.

  Never mind that these two products of the upper middle class write themselves as being poor and underprivileged. Never mind all the PR spinning that has invented a false mythology for the film. Never mind that it is essentially a terrible re-make of Ordinary People (itself overrated. Never mind all of that, and see if for what it is - a bad movie, hackneyed and cliched. For a Romantic Comedy go watch another film that this one steals from - ANNIE HALL. It's much better. And while you are at it, go see BRINGING UP BABY and HOLIDAY and a few Preston Sturges and Ernst Lubitsch films. Maybe then having seen a few of the truly greats will you have the ability to say that it is "the greatest movie of all time" as so many have been saying here.
  
  

• Too cheesy, another Hollywood movie that is silly on Science
  By A30OXD42ZFYZLO on 2005-08-11
  Good Will Hunting by Gus Van Sant was hugely sucessful when it came out. It portrayes the life of a poor janitor who is exceptionally talented in mathematics. Matt Damon is emotionally disturbed and tries to push off people coming too close to him. While parts of the movie are OK, there is too much cheesiness in this movie. There are enough mathematicians and logicians lives that are confusing enough as it is. Take the life of Kurt Godel, the Austrian logician. Robin Williams role as the Psychiatryst bringing out Matt Damon was over done. There was no professionalism in the roles. The amount of bad language is also too much for someone connected with such a movie.
  
  As I have seen multiple times, Hollywood is terrible at portraying science and scientists. It shows Matt Damon good at Chemistry, Mathematics, History and Economics. Areas nowadays are so advanced that people have trouble keeping up with parts of one area, there is no way anyone can be a novice at multiple areas let alone an expert. As the mathematician Hardy said after seeing Ramanujan's papers, that he was able to spend considerable time only on Hypergeometric series, as it was close to his heart. Also, it shows the lack of understanding of Mathematics too, the great days of theorem proving are gone, nowadays most mathematical research is spent on developing new areas of math or in connecting seemingly unconnected areas of math. One mathematician, Polya, refused to prove existing areas as he wanted to develop his own areas. I would sincerely hope that directors would take more trouble with their research before starting on such movies. The movie shows something about Fields medals but has no clue of the kind of people who win them, which shows how simplistic it is. Overall, I hope that people who makes movies like this and Beautiful Mind do more work before doing such a silly job.
  
  
• very overrated
  By A9Q28YTLYREO7 on 2000-01-30
  i didn't get all the hype about this film.i find it to be just another run of the mill film.a big waste of Robin Williams's talent.as for Matt Damon&Ben Affleck a couple of 2nd tier actors.the cursing is wasted it has no place.just throwing words out.
  
  
• An intelligent story
  By A3CWH6VKCTJAD on 2000-09-03
  This is a very intelligent film about Will Hunting (Matt Damon) a young genius, who because of his disadvantaged and abusive childhood, ends up as a janitor at MIT when he could easily be the head of the Mathematics department. Though the story is a bit far fetched (it is hard to believe a kid this bright wouldn't have been noticed by someone who would have guided him towards higher education), once you put that aside, it is a fascinating character study of a very complex and dynamic young man.

  Will is discovered after solving a math challenge left on a blackboard by the head of the math department at MIT. This throws his life into turmoil, as the mathematicians want to make him into a prodigy. He also begins seeing a therapist (Robin Williams) who forces him to confront many deep emotions and experiences he had been repressing. The effect this has on him, and his relationship with his friends is powerful and makes for an engrossing tale.

  The screenplay was written by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon for which they won an Academy Award (the film was nominated for nine). Both were considered promising young actors before this film, but this tied a rocket pack to their backs and lit the fuse. Damon was outstanding in the lead. He had a very complex character to play and his emotional range was phenomenal. Not only was he quick witted, charming and vibrant, but he also had to be hot headed, arrogant, confused and despondent. He was able to switch emotions with ease and was always intense and believable. Robin Williams also gave one of his better performances and received a best supporting Oscar.

  It is hard not to like this film. Most of the challenges that Will faced were inside him, and watching him struggle to overcome the limitations from his past was very uplifting. I rated this film a 9/10. We need more scripts like this. Perhaps if we are lucky, Damon and Affleck will take time from their successful acting careers and collaborate again.
  
  

• Deceptively ambitous in concept, near perfect in execution
  By A27PSZX2SE0B51 on 2001-02-21
  This is a much more ambitious project than would appear at first glance. Given the benefit of hindsight, it would seem like a no-brainer to let Ben and Matt try their hands at writing a buddy movie with lots of male bonding and weepy emotion. But coming from two unknown commodities, it really is a startling achievement.

  Their script goes down several paths that seasoned scriptwriters don't dare tread, for if they are not done perfectly they tend to collapse like a house of cards on a waterbed.

  First, we get the working class buddies. Affleck, his brother Casey, Cole Hauser, and Damon have wonderful and believable chemistry together as a bunch of South Boston wiseguys. We see them cruising for burgers and chicks, picking fights, and going to work, with a habit of ease obviously built over years and years. Later on, someone says of Affleck's character's relationship with Damon's: "Chuckie's family, he'd lie down in...traffic for you." The line becomes superfluous, a validation of things we've already seen for ourselves.

  Second, we get the tortured genius/prodigy. The credit here must be split in two places. First, the script takes great pains in its authenticity. Apparently the theorems that Will solves are as complex as portrayed, and are solved in the appropriate manner. Most movie portrayals of genius tend to fudge that part of the equation, hoping that the audience is dumb enough to not recognize that the guitar virtuoso is not really playing the song (a problem that I found distracting in Woody Allen's "Sweet and Lowdown") or that the great writer's words are not up to snuff (as is the problem in director Van Sant's later film "Finding Forrester"). Second, Damon himself does a wonderful job in showing both the ease at which this math comes to him, and the coiled frustration that it burdens him with.

  Third, we get the mentors. Stellan Skarsgard, as the mathematician who discovers Will, could have easily settled for being a two-dimensional villain. But his Prof. Lambeau is believably flawed, and his displaced ambition never becomes cartoonish or unredeemably destructive. Robin Williams, as the psychologist Will is court-ordered to see, manages nary a moment of his patented over-the-top showmanship. Rather, his Sean is reserved, anguished, and powerful, but always in very subtle ways. Williams does his best work portraying Sean's grief, calling it up in a matter-of-fact way until it needs to boil over and lash out to protect itself, as it does in his first scene with Will. Their relationship ends up strengthening over time, culminating in one final scene of catharsis that if portrayed by lesser actors with a lesser script, would come across as schmaltzy, but here is very real and very moving.

  Fourth, we get the girl. I remember when this movie first came out, Minnie Driver's character took a lot of flak for throwing herself so shamelessly at Will, who obviously wasn't capable at giving her anything back. On looking at the movie again, it is astounding to me that this act of courage could be criticized so. Her Skylar -- Driver does a wonderful job at portraying her joie de vivre, as well as her self-consciousness -- is set up for life, both in her education and in her finances, so she doesn't really need a hardship case like Will. And yet she loves him, and repeatedly tells him so, knowing full well that he's not going to say it back. Sure, for the most part it's borderline masochistic, and she puts herself through a needless amount of torture, but wouldn't an easier road be less satisfying? And wouldn't a less complex character for boy genius Will to be confronted with just become easy prey? Yes and yes, I say.

  These four items, combined with its flair for solid and sometimes flashy dialogue ("How do you like them apples?"), make up a wonderful film. It makes good on all its promises, and manages to be entertaining, emotional, and assuredly worthwhile.
  
  

• A masterpiece that deserved more credit
  By on 2003-02-16
  Amazing piece of work! This is the movie in 1997 that should have won best picture, not that sorry-excuse-for-a-drama Titanic. Puh-lease! I don't think people truly realize the genius behind a film like Good Will Hunting. This story is so intelligent and thought-provoking that several producers who read the script could not fathom it was written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, actors who at their age would normally be portraying drunken frat boys at a party. After all, there are some very mature themes in this movie: abuse, personal pain, distrust and coping with guilt. Yet, there were also comic elements in the film that kept the story from becoming too serious and depressing. This movie demonstrates that despite our natural talents and strengths, we are still vulnerable human beings who get hurt. Absolutely Brilliant! It would have been understandable if this was written by a psychologist, but it wasn't. Hence the widespread acclaim and brilliance behind this piece of work! If THAT is not an indication of sheer genius, then tell me what is? Please, don't say a big boat that collides with an Iceberg.

  The acting in Good Will Hunting on all accounts was superb. This was by far Robin Williams's best role to date. He nailed the part with such frank and believable honesty. It couldn't have been done any better. I'm glad he finally got his long deserved oscar. Thankfully, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon did, too. It would have been a crime if the authors of this brilliant work didn't receive the recognition they deserved.

  Titanic...King of the world my .... Make way for some real talent.
  
  

• Engaging Story, Intelligent Script & Superb Acting
  By A18RQ2URRGIIEA on 2003-02-25
  "Good Will Hunting" was one of the best films in 1997 thanks to a combination of excellent direction, brilliant writing and superb acting to create an engaging drama for the audience to embrace. Being the first film ever written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, director Gus Van Sant (who also directed "My Own Private Idaho" in 1991 and "To Die For" in 1995), created a very plausible atmosphere for the unusual story to unfold:

  A young genius named Will Hunting (Matt Damon) never attended college, but read mathematical, scientific and literary books on his own for many years. Severely abused as a child in an adoptive home, Will now prefers to exist as a manual laborer living in a condemned house in a dilapidated Boston neighborhood. While working as a janitor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) one night, he solves a heretofore unsolvable mathematical problem written on a classroom chalkboard. The professor who originally transcribed the problem, Gerald Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgård), is shocked to find the problem solved but doesn't know who solved it. He eventually finds Will, but Will was arrested and jailed for his involvement in a beating while on a night out with his best friend Chuckie Sullivan (Ben Affleck), who is a true manual laborer. Determined to save Will from himself, Gerald enlists the aid of a former friend & college roommate, Sean Maquire (Robin Williams), who now works as a community college psychology teacher, to provide psychological therapy for Will. To be released from jail, Will agrees to regular counseling sessions with Sean and to work for Gerald. The initial therapy sessions between Will and Sean are very intense (more so for Sean than for Will, as Will uses his genius to tear into Sean's core and has had a lot of previous psychotherapy experience), but Sean finds ways to work with him. Complicating matters, a mutual attraction develops between Will and a female MIT student, Skylar (Minnie Driver).

  Though some that watch this film may be disturbed by the violence depicted when Will relentlessly beats a man, it helps to demonstrate how deeply troubled the character is. Other well acted supporting characters in the film include Morgan O'Mally (played by Casey Affleck, Ben Affleck's younger brother) and Billy McBride (played by Cole Hauser). Ben Affleck did a good job with his portrayal of Will's friend Chuckie.

  "Good Will Hunting" earned Matt Damon and Ben Affleck the Oscar for Best Writing for a Screenplay and Robin Williams won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Other Oscar nominations received include Best Picture, Best Editing, Best Original Music, Best Song, Matt Damon for Best Actor, Minnie Driver for Best Supporting Actress and Gus Van Sant for Best Director. Overall, I give "Good Will Hunting" a rating of 5 out of 5 stars and highly recommend it to anyone that enjoys a well-acted, gripping, psychological drama.
  
  

• Fun, Real, Deep, Excellent
  By A1PQNUIMLIOJ7R on 2003-03-15
  Director Gus Van Sant did a fine job directing the excellent actors in this film. There are a lot of similarities to his other film "Finding Forrester" with Sean Connery and Rob Brown, but this one has a very special and different feel to it. I was amazed at how well written the screenplay came from Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, which earned them each an Academy Award. Robin Williams was fantastic, and earned an Academy Award as well. He really got into his role, as well as the rest of them. Good Will Hunting is a very memorable film about a troubled young man with recognizable great potential, with strong friendships that inspire him to be better. This was a great role for all characters. However, if you happen to be someone who takes offense to foul language, you'll want to be prepared to hear a lot of it. Its R rating was well deserved, due to pervasive strong language, some sexual dialogue, and a scene of violence. For another movie with similar taste and not so much profanity, I would recommend Finding Forrester. Good Will Hunting was an amazing and memorable film. It was well worth my time.
  
  
• A movie that degrades human creativity
  By on 1999-01-27
  Why is Matt Damon's character a mathematical genius? I'll tell you why: math is incomprehensible to the average person. This makes it believable to most people that an ill-educated janitor can instantly understand advanced mathematics simply with a glance. However, even recognized geniuses such as Ramanujan had to work at math constantly.

  Also most people don't comprehend why mathematicians do what they do. Damon and Afleck don't either. They put mathematicians on the same level as success-conscious corporate fleas. For example, the 'Nobel Prize' of mathematics featured heavily in this movie as the ultimate goal. But most mathematicians don't give a damn about awards. They do it because of the beauty of numbers.

  And what about the bar scene, when Hunting first meets Minnie Driver and astounds everyone with his book knowledge? Is that even the least bit realistic? Does he go home and read those books? Apparently not, but maybe he browsed through them in the bookstore...

  I find it interesting that everyone pushes Will Hunting to become a mathematician because he can become 'great,' even though he has no such desire. I bet most people accepted this as natural; I find it demeaning. How many children are told, "You're not good at that so go do something that the standardized test showed you were good at."

  In the end, all this movie does is misrepresent the world of mathematicians and insult their efforts. Not just mathematicians, but all those who pursue their dreams for the sake of their Art.
  
  

• Dead Poets Society
• A Beautiful Mind (Widescreen Awards Edition)
• Finding Forrester
• Forrest Gump (Two-Disc Special Collector's Edition)