ENGLISH ASSIGNMENT

Name- Parimita Singh

Roll number- 21/55
Course- BA Programme (4th semester)

The source I have chosen to dissect and analyse here is Gus Van Sant’s 1997 film ‘Good Will
Hunting’. The Hollywood film falls under the genre of psychological drama, and is an
Academy Award winning movie. It is not about the growth and healing of one person but
many, and there certainly is no stereotypical all-good ‘hero’. The movie, in all its brilliance,
lays bare the chinks in the armour of every character. However, if one were to circle out the
‘main character’, it would be William Hunting, or ‘Will’.

Will is an underprivileged prodigy from Boston. Working as a janitor at the prestigious

Massachusetts Institute of Technology and living in a one-room house that has a junkyard
for a garden, all he has to boast about is his very loyal group of four friends and his eidetic
memory. He is adept at solving complex mathematical problems, which is illustrated when
he solves one written outside a classroom by a mathematics professor. It becomes clear that
Chuckie is Will’s best friend, as he pulls up to Will’s house every morning in his dilapidated
car and a cup of coffee for him. Together they commute to their respective workplaces, and
the four reconvene every evening at a local bar. Pursuing the same girls, drinking the same
beer, and with their stories mostly revolving around each other, they spend more time
together than apart.

Will is not without his own share of problems. Having been a delinquent juvenile, he has a
record of repeated assault and larceny. However, he always chooses to represent himself in
court and uses his extensive legal knowledge to quote legal precedents to get himself
acquitted. That is, until, he gets involved in a neighbourhood clash of gangs with a childhood
bully. It is then that the mathematics professor from the college he works at pleads with the
judge to let him on two conditions- that Will be under professor Lambeau’s supervision and
that he consult a therapist for his anti-social behaviour.

It is then that Will gets exposed to the world of the intellectual. The stark contrast between
the young man’s working-class attitude and street smartness, and the professor’s
expectations of Will’s obedience creates a tension that stays until the end of the movie. Will
repeatedly rejects the elitist notions of higher-class society, and dismisses the attempts of
therapists to ‘cure’ him. One is led to believe that he believes it is the society that needs
curing, and not him. Finally, the only therapist who is able to tolerate Will’s scathing taunts
is Professor Sean Maguire.

Their first few meetings are apparently unproductive. When Will speaks ill of the professor’s
wife who died of cancer, he instantly gets defensive. It is then that one realises that the path
to recovery and self-actualisation must be undertaken by both parties. While one needs to
be taught that the world isn’t so harsh as they imagine it to be, the other needs to come to
terms with the grief of losing a loved one. However, over the course of their next few
sessions, they begin lowering each other’s defences. The professor brings Will’s attention to
the fact that he uses his knowledge as a weapon, to hurt people before they can hurt him.
Will, in turn, gets him to open up about his deceased wife and talks to him about exploring
the world beyond a person who is now dead. Both are victims of child abuse, and though
separated by a generation gap, relate to each other on a level of which only a fraction is
understood by the observer and other characters in the film.

A warm but tense dynamic also builds between Will and Skylar, a Harvard undergraduate
Will met at a bar. The more time they spend together, the more deeply Will falls in love with
her, and not wanting his financial situation and lack of a family to scare her of, he lies to her.
However, when the possibility of having a real future with her comes up, the difference
between her posh and moneyed British accent and his work boots and street lingo is too
much for him to digest, and so he balks. When Will’s best friend Chuckie learns of this and
of his insistence to labour as a construction worker, he puts aside his braggadocio behaviour
to bare his deepest desire to Will- that he would be the happiest if one day he knocks at
Will’s door and gets no answer, implying that Will would have moved on to greater things in
life.

It is this talk with Chuck, coupled with a complete breakdown of his defences at the
therapist’s office, that leads Will to reverse his entire perspective on life. He goes to a job
interview with sincerity for the first time, and drives to California to make things right with
the woman he loves. One can also see Professor Sean Maguire packing up his things, as he
chooses to give thought to Will’s suggestion to explore the world and get out of the
comforting bubble of grief he has created for himself. One can feel relief wash over their
heart as the film ends, as every character combats and emerges victorious over their
greatest insecurities.

Will undergoes a tremendous character development over the course of the film, beginning
as an obnoxious but highly talented young adult and ending with him getting a shot at a
future he never knew he deserved. As he breaks down the walls he has spent years building
around himself, so does his therapist. It is cathartic to see them grow together, hand-in-
hand.