The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015. Remaining movies: 248 Days to go: 251
Movie #129: Good Will Hunting
I think about Good Will Hunting a lot. I think about how Minnie Driver lost weight from her breakout role in Circle of Friends, where she played a slightly heavy but completely lovable girl, and then achieved a higher level of stardom from her role as Skylar here. I think about Robin Williams getting the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as Sean, playing such a calm, centered nurturing guy (the Oscars love it when you play against type), and whether or not I agree with the win (of the nominees, yes — overall, I still don’t know). I also think about Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s friendship and how these two dudebros managed to write this great little script, win a freaking Oscar for it, rocket into superstardom, and forever be referred to in movie trailers as “Academy Award Winner” so-n-so. And then I get really pissed off and have to stop thinking about Good Will Hunting for a while.
Matt Damon has won one Oscar, for writing Good Will Hunting. He has been nominated for two more, once for Lead Actor (in Good Will Hunting) and once for Supporting Actor (in Invictus). If Matt Damon is starring in a movie, touting him as an Academy Award Winner, while technically correct, is misleading. Unless he wrote the movie, his only relevant Oscar contribution is as an Academy Award-Nominated actor.
Ben Affleck is even worse. He has no acting awards, no acting nominations. He’s won two Oscars, one for writing Good Will Hunting and one for producing Best Picture winner Argo. Unless he’s written and/or produced the movie you’re promoting, you really have no place trading on his Academy Award Winner status. I am not a crackpot.
On the serious side, I feel like somewhere down the line a piece of Good Will Hunting seeped into my subconsciousness and made me a more patient, more caring person. (If you are reading this and you know me personally, don’t laugh. I really am more patient and caring than I was pre-1997, I swear.) The movie is ostensibly about this genius kid Will (Damon) who solves impossible math problems in his free time and maybe has an eidetic memory but grew up in a tough neighborhood with a tough childhood, lives at or below the poverty line and has a history of run-ins with the cops, but who gets a chance at a promising future of limitless possibilities from a renowned professor (Stellan Skarsgard) who arranges for him to avoid jail for his latest assault on the condition Will meets with him to do math and goes to therapy with Sean (Williams). What it’s really about, however, is someone who’s more interested in being a smart-ass than being authentic or sincere. It’s all defense mechanisms and walls put up to keep anyone from getting too close to him because deep down he doesn’t think he’s worth loving and he doesn’t want the people he cares about to figure that out. That could maybe come off clichéd, but it doesn’t because of how real Will’s character is — not the super genius part, but the angry young man throwing his life away because he’s convinced it doesn’t mean anything part. That’s a character I know well — it’s someone I’ve been, and it’s people I’ve loved — and I really believe something about this movie helped me be more patient with those people (myself included), helped me build them up and support them instead of being petty and judgmental. But it also helped me be more frank and open about my needs, my hopes and my limits.
Will doesn’t want to hear Sean or Jerry (Skarsgard) tell him how crazy it is to throw his life away, because he doesn’t think they understand him and he believes they’re supposed to say that sort of stuff to him. When his buddy Chuckie (Affleck) tells him how stupid he’s being, however, his ears perk up. He takes heed of that advice because it’s coming from an unexpected source, in an unexpectedly blunt manner. “Look, you’re my best friend, so don’t take this the wrong way but, in twenty years if you’re still living here, coming over to my house, watching the Patriots games, working construction, I’ll fucking kill you. That’s not a threat, that’s a fact, I’ll fucking kill you.” Sometimes that’s what it takes to get through to someone, and somewhere along the line, I’ve internalized that little nugget of truth as well.
So just remember: If I tell you something is fucking stupid, it doesn’t mean I’m not being patient and caring.
Viable Option 