Good Will Hunting

Love Can Actualize Potential // An Analysis of This & That's #1 Movie of All Time

This & That

Jan 06, 2025

Good Will Hunting – Love Can Actualize Potential

@th1sandth8t The beauty of Good Will Hunting lies in its nuanced exploration of a troubled young man’s journey towards self-acceptance, through a compelling story that blends raw emotion with intellectual depth, showcasing the power of genuine human connection and the importance of confronting one’s past to achieve personal growth, all while being presented in a relatable and often poignant way; it’s a film that resonates with audiences by offering a complex, yet ultimately hopeful perspective on the human condition. #goodwillhunting

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@th1sandth8t Goodwill Hunting best scenes - Sean tells Will about the day he met his wife Will begs the question “when did you know she was the one?” After hearing the question, Money Maguire’s brainwaves get rampant and his dopamine is spiked because, in his head, he is now in the prime of his life again, pregaming with his boys at a bar next to Fenway before game 6 of the world series. The dopamine, though, has nothing to do with his boys or one of the most miraculous games in baseball history, it had to do with his future wife who he met at the bar. He tells Will that he indeed missed the walk-off homer that hit that left field pole over the Green Monster because “he had to go see about a girl”. Naturally, Hunting calls him a SIMP for fading game 6 for some girl that he didn’t even know “I don’t care if Helen of Troy walks in the room that shits game 6! And who were these friends of yours that let you do that” to which the reminiscent grizzly bear replies sternly “they saw in my eyes that I meant it. That’s why I’m not talking about some girl I met at a bar 20 years ago and how I always regretted not talking to her”. This inconceivable truth is hard to grasp for Will, who has never experienced true love in his life until maybe now. He then asks the hardest-hitting question there is to ask – whether or not he regrets meeting her that day because of all the pain he’s filled with now. As expected, the evocative Panda continues his ‘love is worth it’ spiel, “I don’t regret the 18 years I was married to Nancy and I don’t regret the 6 years I had to give up counseling when she got sick and I don’t regret the last years when she got really sick. And I sure as hell don’t regret missing the damn game. You’ll have good times, but they’ll always wake you up to the good stuff you weren’t paying attention to. So, no, I don’t regret meeting her because of the pain now. I don’t regret a single day I spent with her”. Considering those words ingrained most viewers with a deep yearning for true love, they must’ve hit like 3 points of street molly for Will who was paralyzed in his seat, thoroughly digesting the truest words that had ever entered his ear drums.

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Intro

Good Will Hunting is a film that’s universally rated atop most acclaimed movie lists for plenty of reasons. It’s the type of movie where even self proclaimed niche nonconformist reviewers, who love to go against the tide of the public, are forced to put at the top of their list. These off-brand, eccentric reviewers do their best to label some of the classic all timers (like Shawshank, The Dark Knight and The Godfather) as overrated, but they have no answer for the 20 year old MIT janitor with a genius IQ. The original screenplay started as a class assignment for Matt Damon at Harvard until he dropped out and finished the script with his childhood best friend Ben Affleck because he sensed that he had his hands on something special. Will Hunting is a brilliant but troubled youth in South Boston who’s intelligence is sharply juxtaposed by his degenerative tendencies and construction-working friends. His talents are discovered by a professor and he’s forced into therapy with Robin Williams AKA Sean Maguire making for a dynamic that will leave you therapeutically satiated yourself. The starkly different life paths for the poor prodigy are abundantly apparent from the start, making for a clinical analogy on the system’s natural tendency to keep those at the bottom, at the bottom. Everything about the film is authenticity in the purest form and the real-life ending is storybook as the two kids from Cambridge watch their leap of faith pay off in a big way during their acceptance of the 1997 Oscar for best original screenplay. As they accept the award in the primes of their lives, atop the world of cinema and with a near-certain magical future ahead of them, their humility shines as a beacon amidst the entitled and arrogant Hollyweird , “Winning would be really scary but losing would suck. We are just two young guys who are fortunate enough to be involved with a lot of great people”. The journey in the movie is a heartwarming, emotionally charged voyage similar to Damon and Affleck’s journey to the Oscar stage – if you haven't already seen the story of Will Hunting, grappling with a troubled past & untapped potential, bolstered by the unshakable loyalty of his best friend Chuckie, you should change that the next time you have a free two hours.

The Story

The two distinct worlds are clear from the very start. First, we see Will as a janitor in the intellectually rigorous atmosphere gazing at a complex Math proof on a chalkboard, and then the scene shifts into a grimey but lively bar where we are met by Chuckie’s Southside rizz, “Cathy! Why didn’t you give me none of that nasty little hoochie-woochie you usually throw at me?” While we learn of Will’s genius off the rip as we watch him solve the theorem that no other MIT student or professor could handle, we also learn of his delinquent nature as he gets in a neighborhood scrap after brown bagging with his boys while watching a little league game. As the MIT universe seeks out the mystery mathematician, Professor Lambaeu walks in on Will’s dirty little pleasure – solving complex math proofs. After the initial response to a janitor scribbling on a prestigious institution’s chalkboard, “That’s people’s work, you can’t graffiti here”, Lambeau is astounded to realize that he is indeed the mystery man, but Will is already gone with the wind. Unfortunately for Will’s desire to never actualize his limitless potential, he can now no longer maintain the appearance of an unassuming brainless janitor – a disguise similar to Lebron wearing a referee uniform and watching the inferior players play.

The all bark and some bite crew of 20 year old Boston misfits then takes their talents to a Harvard bar where Chuckie’s Southside rizz isn’t nearly as natural. After telling a fine Harvard woman that he might’ve had History class with her, the Crimson douchebox exposes his cover, “Just History class? I remember taking that in between recess and lunch”. As good ole’ Clark starts regurgitating the pre-Revolutionary War agrarian capitalist state of the southern colonies that he read about in his textbook, Will knows his buddy is way in over his head and steps in, exposing to the whole bar who the real fraud is in one of the most iconic scenes in cinematic history. He caps the “Of course that’s your contention” spiel of intellectual superiority with “you dropped 150 grand on a fuckin’ education you coulda got for $1.50 in late charges at the public library”. As the wealthy frat boy bites back proclaiming that his lack of a degree will land him serving his family fries at the drive through on their way to a skiing trip, Hunting gives his future girlfriend a glimpse into his lowkey noble value system “yeah but at least I won’t be unoriginal”. The savvy display of intuition at the bar leads Skylar to give Will her number on the way out, prompting the end of Clark’s stint in the form of the nearly as iconic “Do you like apples” knockout punch. As the fellas leave the bar hooting and hollering, the audience recognizes that the seed for Will & Skylar’s love story has just been planted in the history books.

Lambeau tracks down the troubled talent who is now arguing in a courtroom as his own lawyer because of the earlier fighting shenanigans. Coupled by his long history of law breaking, his motion to dismiss is denied and he’s placed on $50,000 bail, but luckily for him, Lambeau doesn’t want to see his untapped potential fizzle down the drain. The success and prestige oriented Swedish beast of a professor shows that he values brain power over everything else and takes Will under his wing on the two conditions that he works consistently with him on various advanced math concepts AND that he sees a therapist, a requirement that he naturally laughs at. Lamborghini High takes Hunt on a merry-go-round of boring shrinks who Will toys with, belittling their profession by taunting their questions and lacking an ounce of seriousness. After five consecutive failures, Lambo meets up with his old pal, the just as smart but much less accomplished Sean Maguire, in a final effort to save the boy wonder from his hoodrat inclinations. After hearing the esteemed professor rave about Will’s unique abilities, the also-Southie native agrees to try and turn his future around. In their first meeting, Hunt goes about his usual business scoping the room, criticizing the surrounding quality of books, and arrogantly talking down to the psychologist (a profession he views as a failure). After the usual degradation antics, he makes the crucial mistake of chirping Sean’s dead wife, “you married the wrong girl didn’t you? What’d she leave you or was she banging some other guy”, causing the 285 pound bencher to choke the kid out and show him who the alpha in the room really is. The bold display of physical superiority is a love language of sorts for the Southies - the maneuver undoubtedly forces Will to respect him, a prerequisite for actually opening up to another man. With similar backgrounds and personalities that mesh, if there is any psychologist in Boston that can get Will to take the therapy seriously and overcome his fear of what he might find beneath the surface, it’s Sean Maguire. It’s his stocky hands around the neck of a minor that catalyzes the relationship that takes over the dynamic of the movie.

The two young doves enjoy a cute little first date of trying on goofy accessories and eating some fast food while joking about whether Will will get a goodnight kiss or goodnight lay. They share a kiss and jest about exchanging some pickle remnants… the night certainly had the breadcrumbs of love all over it. Meeting number two with Maguire is at the park, surely a symbol to the audience that genuine conversation and down-to-earth truths will take place. The aging man who is too smart for his salary and too depressed over the death of his wife to be bothered to show up to his college reunion, imparts some wisdom on the young buck, telling him that as smart as he is, knowledge cannot make up for experiences. As opposed to the symbolic love language in their first meeting, this meeting consists of actual love language, “you’ve never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Or known someone that could level you with her eyes. Feelin’ like God put an angel on Earth just for you, who could rescue you from the depths of hell”. General shifts to specific and he alerts Will as to why he reacted so emphatically before, “And you wouldn’t know what it’s like to be her angel. To have that for her be there forever. Through anything. Through cancer. And you wouldn’t know about sleepin’ sittin’ up in a hospital room for two months holding her hand because the doctors could see in your eyes that the terms visiting hours don’t apply to you. You don’t know about the real loss cause that only occurs when you love something more than you love yourself”. He opens up his heart in a profound manner, hoping to facilitate Will’s future reciprocation, but they don’t end on a lovey dovey note; instead, he finalizes session two with his real opinion, “When I look at you I don't see a confident intelligent man, I see a cocky, scared shitless kid. This isn’t gonna work unless you wanna talk about YOU and who you are. But you dont wanna do that because you’re terrified of what you might say. Your move chief”. Battle number three is a “staring contest from two kids from the old neighborhood” and they go the full 60 minutes without uttering a word, as Will attempts to prove that he doesn’t need to talk about himself if he doesn't want to. Finally, in the fourth battle, after a blowjob joke to break the ice, Will starts talking about the perfect perception he has of Skylar after their first date, “She’s smart, she’s fun, she’s different from most of the girls I’ve been with” but admits he hasn’t called her again because he doensn’t want to “realize she’s not that smart and that she’s fucking boring. This girl’s like fuckin perfect right now I don’t wanna ruin that”. The old war horse rightfully pokes fun at his passive philosophy because “that way you can go through your entire life without ever having to really know anybody”. He tells Will that it’s the little idiosyncrasies like how his wife used to fart in her sleep that you end up missing the most in someone you love. After Maguire gets in his John Legend duffel and teaches him a lesson about the beauty of perfect imperfections and how we choose who we let into our weird little worlds filled with unique peccadilloes, he briefs the kid on the reality of reality, “You're not perfect and she isn't perfect either. But the question is whether or not you're perfect for each other”. Following this profound quote, when Sean tells Will that he never plans on getting remarried, boy wonder flashes his wit and gives the psychoanalyzer a taste of his own medicine, “That's a super philosophy Sean, that way you can go the rest of your life without ever really knowing anybody”.

The discourse between the two often ventures into the realms of philosophy and love, producing universal truths about the depths of the human experience that commands the audience's full attention: the rapport between Matt Damon and Robin Williams is precisely what makes this movie one of the best of all time.

The other passionate rapport with the soon-to-be Stanford Med School student also commands the audience’s attention. The young British gal, who’s education will ultimately be worth $250k, is drawn to Will precisely because her private school intellect is nothing compared to that of the king of the Southie public library. After a long no-call-back period after the first date, she’s pleased to find Hunt at her dorm room but tells him she has Harvard shit to do and can’t go out with him that night. Will can’t sit back and wait for her to solve the fantastically boring proton spectrum for ibogamine, when he can do it in ten minutes on a napkin and picnic table. He jokes about sleeping with someone in her class to get the answers, convincing her to fade the actual learning process and let him carry the boats “what are you going into surgery tomorrow?” Obviously, the two enjoy a wondrous second date at a dog race and Will’s perfect perception of her does not wane. Skylar’s dog wins, indicative of the flourishing relationship, and we see that Boy Wonder is still unable to tell her that he was a foster child, misleading her into believing that he has 13 brothers in his gargantuan Irish Catholic nuclear family. During some lovey dovey pillow talk, Skylar expresses her desire to understand more about Will’s life and meet his family + friends, “what I told you that I won’t sleep with you again until I meet your friends?” And just like that, Skylar is at the bar with Chuckie and the rest of the gang; she passes the ferdality test after chasing Chuck’s “the statie’s police cruiser is in my uncle’s garage” story, with a heinous tale of her own. Things are trending well between the two doves, maybe too well for Will who can’t stop thinking about the fact that she’s leaving the Boston area in the near future.

In the next session (the fifth but who’s counting) with Seany baseball, one of the best dialogues in the film is in the air when Will begs the question “when did you know she was the one?” After hearing the question, Money Maguire’s brainwaves get rampant and his dopamine is spiked because, in his head, he is now in the prime of his life again, pregaming with his boys at a bar next to Fenway before game 6 of the world series. The dopamine, though, has nothing to do with his boys or one of the most miraculous games in baseball history, it had to do with his future wife who he met at the bar. He tells Will that he indeed missed the walk-off homer that hit that left field pole over the Green Monster because “he had to go see about a girl”. Naturally, Hunting calls him a SIMP for fading game 6 for some girl that he didn’t even know “I don't care if Helen of Troy walks in the room that shits game 6! And who were these friends of yours that let you do that” to which the reminiscent grizzly bear replies sternly “they saw in my eyes that I meant it. That’s why I'm not talking about some girl I met at a bar 20 years ago and how I always regretted not talking to her”. This inconceivable truth is hard to grasp for Will, who has never experienced true love in his life until maybe now. He then asks the hardest-hitting question there is to ask – whether or not he regrets meeting her that day because of all the pain he’s filled with now. As expected, the evocative Panda continues his ‘love is worth it’ spiel, “I don't regret the 18 years I was married to Nancy and I don’t regret the 6 years I had to give up counseling when she got sick and I don't regret the last years when she got really sick. And I sure as hell don't regret missing the damn game. You'll have good times, but they'll always wake you up to the good stuff you weren't paying attention to. So, no, I don't regret meeting her because of the pain now. I don't regret a single day I spent with her”. Considering those words ingrained most viewers with a deep yearning for true love, they must’ve hit like 3 points of street molly for Will who was paralyzed in his seat, thoroughly digesting the truest words that had ever entered his ear drums.

The next pivotal scene features the argument about Will’s future between Sean and Lambo. This was a quarrel that seemed like it was building up between the two academics with vastly different worldviews and varying degrees of accolades to their name. They discuss their differing visions for his future; Lambo wants to give him exposure to top tier jobs so he can actualize his potential while Sean wants the kid to figure his life out on his own. The dispute gets heated, “direction is one thing, manipulation is another. There’s more to life than a fucking Field’s medal. Why don’t we give him time to figure out what he wants” the down-to-Earth psychologist reasons. “Oh what a wonderful plan, that worked for you real well” the ambitious mathematician claps back. Tensions between the two climax as the anti-materialism lover boy calls the prestige-hungry professor an ‘arrogant fucking prick’. The rigid bickering then transitions into Chuckie, Will’s chief negotiator, rinsing the McNeil pricks of all the cash in their wallets as a retainer.

Hunt had to send his chief negotiator because he was too busy swimming through the waters of affection, as Skylar tries to understand how his brain works over some coffee. He tells her that he doesn’t have a photographic memory, but rather, he just knows ‘how to play’, “Beethoven and Mozart they just looked at a piano and it just made sense to them. They could just play. I don’t know how to play piano, and I can’t hit a ball out of Fenway, but when it comes to stuff like your Orgo paper, I could always just play”. Congruent with the notion that every chick loves a player, Skylar ends the coffee chats with a kiss, telling him “Life’s not fair. I've been here for four years and I've only just found you”. The fireworks start to really pop when we are taken to the next scene in her bedroom and she pleads “come to California with me”. The hypothetical is a scary one for Will and his commitment issues caused by his traumatic childhood. Skylar does her best to convince the Southie Scum to leave town for once, “What are you so scared of? You live in this safe little world where no one challenges you and you're scared shitless to do anything else”. This gets the Boston Bulldog all sorts of riled up… “don't tell me about my world. You just wanna have your fling with the guy from the other side of town and then you're gonna go to Stanford and marry some rich prick who your parents will approve of and sit around with the other trust fund babies and talk about how you went slumming too once”. After exchanging blows like Ali and Frazier, they really open up to each other as Skylar reveals to Will that her dad died when she was 13 and he reciprocates with the knowledge that he’s an orphan and his marks on his stomach aren’t from surgery but rather a stabbing. The Blue Sky, now in tears, tells Will the reality of the situation, “You're afraid I won’t love you back. I'm afraid too but fuck it I wanna at least give it a shot. If you say you don't love me then I won't call you or be in your life”. Woah… now they are paused… What will Will say… suspense building… is he going to Cali or is he fading profusely? Will the kid listen to his wise psychologist and ‘go see about a girl’ or will he continue to rip darts and lay bricks with Chuckie and the boys in a world of mediocrity? Is he willing to pursue love despite the possibility of paramount pain? “I DON'T LOVE YOU”. Banggg, those four words go down like Mike Breen during EASTER 2012 at The Garden and it’s medlum for the CityBoys watching the film who are now going berserk, cheering like Steve Novak after watching Melo cash that shit from deep. Hunting is gone with the wind, and the Sky gets bluer, crying alone in her dorm room.

Will then meets up with Prof Lambeau and turns his heartbreak into arrogant truthfulness the way the Solid Oxide Electrolyzer turns CO2 into Oxygen (technology that, if improved, will allow humans to live in Mars’ CO2 dominant atmosphere). He big dogs the award-winning professor with a pent up anger catalyzed by the liquidation of his heart and exemplified by the burning of the math proof, “Do you have any idea how easy this is for me, this is a fucking joke. I’m sorry you can’t do this so I wouldn’t have to sit here and watch you fumble around and fuck it up”. The professor, though, is one to recognize the truth and Will’s genius cannot be neglected, “There's only a handful of people that can tell the difference between you and me. Most days I wish I never met you because then I could sleep at night and I didn't have to walk around with the knowledge that there's someone like you out there. And so I didn’t have to watch you throw it all away”. This quote serves as the gasoline that empowers the fire under Will’s ass; his tough decision to leave Skylar coupled with Lambo’s words that are left ringing in his ear make for a badass interview with the National Security Agency.

The government gremlins do their best to sell themselves to the Chosen One, citing their advanced tech that no one else in the world has access to as well as their groundbreaking work in super string theory, chaos math and advanced algos as reason for Boy Wonder to join the most powerful intelligence agency in the world, and make the strongest even stronger. The Dragon Warrior has always been able to read between the lines though, “Code breaking is what you do. You handle 80 % of the intelligence workload and are 7x the size of the cia”. Perceived as an obvious complement at the time, they tell him he’s exactly right so the real question is “why shouldn’t you work for us” to which the kid answers clinically. He speaks beautifully to the malicious, politicized and greedy nature of US intelligence and military “Let’s say I break a code that no one else can. What if that code was the location of some rebel army in North Africa or the Middle East and they get bombed. 1500 people I’ve never met before and had no problem with get killed […] Meanwhile, [the Southie marine] realizes the only reason he was there in the first place was so we could install a government that would sell us oil at a good price”. There’s more to this rant that you gotta check out in the video linked above, but this is the scene that made me realize not that ‘Will Hunting’ is a genius, but that Matt Damon actually went to Harvard and wrote this shit himself. He hits the nail square on the head with this scene as the fact that the NSA is the most powerful agency in the world, with the ability to control the data for every American agency and government branch is super slept on. This New York Times Article touches on the silent yet tremendous power the NSA holds, declaring “The N.S.A. is much more than a massive computerized funnel that collects, channels and sorts information for the President and such organizations as the Central Intelligence Agency and F.B.I. The National Security Agency, an arm of the Defense Department but under the direct command of the Director of Central Intelligence, is an electronic spying operation, and its leverage is based on a massive bank of what are believed to be the largest and most advanced computers now available to any bureaucracy in the world: computers to break codes, direct spy satellites, intercept electronic messages, recognize target words in spoken communications and store, organize and index all of it”. Yeah, Boy Wonder is certainly wicked smaht.

Following the unreal display of fantastical truth-telling, Maguire begs the question that needs to be begged “do you feel alone? Do you have soulmates? Someone that opens up things for you and touches your soul?” The clinic continues for Hunt, “Yeah I got Shakespeare, Nietzche, Frost, O’Conner, Kant, Pope, Locke”. Maguire figured he’d say something like that, and I figured he would respond with something like “You'll never have that kind of relationship in a world where you're always afraid to take the first step because all you see is every negative thing 10 miles down the road”. The energy gets real in their penultimate meeting and Sean takes one last chance at picking the kid's brain to see what he really wants for his future, “What are you passionate about, what do you want in life?” Will defers, asking what’s wrong with laying bricks or being a janitor because they are honorable professions. He reiterates that he didn’t ask for his gifts and is tired of hearing people try to tell him what he should be doing. But the grizzly bear lays down the hammer, “Don't cop out behind ‘I didn't ask for this’. You could’ve been a janitor anywhere why’d you choose to work at the most prestigious technical college in the whole fucking world? And then why’d you sneak around at night solving other people’s formulas that only a few people in the world could do and then lie about it? ‘Cause I don't see a lot of honor in that will”. He tactically alludes to the notion that he wanted his talent to get noticed and find himself in the very situation that he's in with links to him and the professor and plentiful opportunities for big time jobs. Will knows exactly what he’s insinuating which is why he pisses on his deep, simple question “I wanna be a shepherd and tend to sheep”. Before giving him the boot, Sean says he can’t give him a straight answer because he doesn’t know himself.

Skylar throws one last Hail Mary in the air before her flight and calls Will, testing the waters to see if he’s changed his mind. In a quick call filled with emotions on both ends, she tells Will “I love you” once more to which he replies “take care” before hanging up the pay phone in another monstrous win for the CityBoys organization. The film transitions into a pissed off Will taking overtime hacks at the wall during the end of his construction shift and then into the game changing words of advice from Chuckie as they guzz a beer complemented by inhaling a cancer stick after an honest day’s work. After Will fantasizes about how they are going to live in Boston their whole life and take their kids to Little League games together, Chuckie Cheese tells Will the words that he needed to hear in order to change the course of his lifeship and actualize his potential, “You don't owe it to yourself, you owe it to me. You're sitting on a winning lottery ticket and you're too much of a pussy to cash it in. It would be an insult to us if you're still here in 20 years. Hanging around here is a fuckin waste of your time”. His best friend is the only one who can truly impact his thoughts deeply and actually change his course of action, and the most impactful words come when he says “The best part of my day is the 10 seconds from when I get to your house to pick you up to when you come outside. Because maybe you won't be there, no goodbye, no see ya later. You just left”. This iconic scene epitomizes the greatness of Affleck’s Chuck. He not only has the awareness to accept that the simplistic Boston manual labor route is his life path (and that it sucks), and not Will’s, but also the selflessness to give his best friend the gut punch that he needed in order to catapult him into achieving great things in this world instead of working a job next to people like him who can’t solve y=mx+b. A good friend would have drank that beer and smoked that dart with Will, basking in the fantasy of taking their kids to Little League games and going to the same Southie bars, but Chuck is not a good friend, he’s his best friend who’s been around Will’s unmatched intuition for far too long to let that delusion become a reality.

The Jerry/Sean WWE Monday Night Raw session two gets under way, and the stakes are higher and the tensions more volatile. It’s a classic matchup of the necessity of ambition, hard work and goals against the broadness of life and the importance of individuality + being an autonomous decision maker. On one hand, the Swedish work horse, whose life has been driven by his professional accomplishments facilitated by consistent motivation, argues that if they just let him figure his life out on his own, he’ll find himself “in jail or a janitor or hanging out with a bunch of retarded gorillas”. He thinks the psychologist’s Freudian crap is a myth, and a mere symbol of a weak mind – “Don't infect him with the idea that it's ok to be a failure”. The Southie therapist, whose life has prioritized love and overall well being, explains why Will is the way that he is, “He was abandoned by the people that were supposed to love him the most. And he hangs out with those ‘retarded gorillas’ because any one of them would knock you out if he asked them to. It’s called loyalty. He pushes people away before they have the chance to leave him. It's a defense mechanism that’s left him alone for 20 years and if you push him right now it's gonna be all the same”. They are both right to an extent which is why it makes for such an intricate dynamic – the added layer of depth necessary for a movie to be considered one of the greatest of all time. And the depth here isn’t so deep because they both argue good points as to ‘which path is better for Will’. The extent here lies in the fact that these two mindsets both have his best interest at heart but differ in their respective plans of attack because of how they perceive the world + the human experience. We all will go through life wondering which professional career is truly best for us and while Jerry is right that we must always have goals, be ambitious, and never be infected with the idea that failure is ok, Sean is also right because none of our ‘accomplishments’ will mean anything if we aren’t happy with our overall lives, forming loving relationships, and pursuing an individual career path that we came to ourselves as opposed to the one thrusted on us by society & our parents. We must do what we love and love what we do. We must be devoted to our professional goals while also paying abundant attention to our life goals, tending to our relationships like a gardener watering his plants. Life is a vast game which is why we must pursue this as well as that. Pursuing only one will leave you like Louis Litt, an ultra successful lawyer but 50 years old with no friends or intimacy crippled by his rage and anxiety accumulated throughout the years due to his lack of relational satisfaction. Pursuing only the other side of the equation will leave you as a Costa Rican surfer & psychedelic adventurer, and while you might think you’re the chillest dude in the world for a decade, you’ll turn 50 yourself and question everything about your life and why you have no money in your pocket to go experience all the great things there are to experience around the world. We must find a way to have both Litt’s professional ambition working a job we love, while also possessing the Costa Rican’s emotional intelligence, open-mindedness, ability to vibe face, and curate meaningful relationships. We must have this as well as that in order to live our best lives. The ping pong match between Sean and Jerry continues, shifting from Will to their own built-up personal issues. The mildly defeated Sweed, who probably knows deep down Jerry is more right than him, initializes, “If you're angry at me for being what you could have been…” (ping) → “I can't stand that condescending look. That’s why I didn’t go to the reunions. My life was a conscious choice and I'm proud of what I do. I didnt fuck up” (pong) → “Yeah you were smarter than me back then and you’re smarter than me now, so don’t blame me how your life turned out it's not my fault” (ping), → “It's not about you you mathematical dick, it's about the boy” (pong). After a brilliant game between This and That, Will’s face symbolically appears right in between the two, and he and Sean begin their last meeting

Will tells him he and Skylar broke up and that he took the professor’s job at McNeil to which Maguire tells him if that’s what he truly wants, then he’s happy for him. The two get the deepest they’ve ever been as they sympathize with each other for both getting whaled on as kids and Sean tells Will that he indeed is taking his advice and putting ‘his money back on the table’ – AKA taking time off his job and going to travel the world and write a bit. He repeatedly tells Hunt ‘It’s not your fault’ with regards to his life being plagued by orphanage and abuse, leading to a good cry and an intimate moment between the two Southie Bulldogs who’s love-hate relationship is certainly ending on the love side. They exchange some contact info with the intent of staying in touch as Maguire’s last words influentially advise Will, “You do what's in your heart son and you’ll be fine”.

Sean and Jerry finally kiss and make up. They apologize to each other, agree to put the beef behind them and hit a midday trip to the local pub. Meanwhile, we learn that it’s Will’s 21st birthday and the fellas got him a new, unappealing but functionally sound, car. Hunt drops a miscellaneous note in Sean’s mailbox and Chuckie’s fantasy comes true as Will is absent the next day when he goes to pick him up for work. Maguire opens the note and finds that Will took his advice just the way he took Will’s, “If the professor calls about that job, just tell him: Sorry, I had to go see about a girl”. The scene cuts to Will driving across the country in his glorious shitbox and that’s the goddamn film folks. While some viewers are surprised at his last-minute decision to leave, others could predict, based on the ultimate string of events, that his departure was inevitable. There were two main X-Factors that finally pushed Will out of his comfort zone & the Boston area: first, Chuck’s tenacious words of advice “You’re sitting on the winning lottery ticket and you’re too much of a pussy to cash it in. You don’t owe it to yourself, fuck that. You owe it to me”. The second factor was Sean’s decision to take Will’s advice and ‘ante up again’ while leaving him with the words to follow his heart. After hearing his best friend look him dead in the eye and tell him that it’d be an insult to him if he’s still here X years in the future and learning that the only adult he’s ever had a profound relationship with took his advice, he has the realization that he must take their advice in order to realize his potential and pursue love. The ending is bittersweet for Chuckie as Hunt takes his first real step toward a future dictated by affection and choice, rather than past trauma. As the sun sets and the credits roll, I can’t help but think "Good Will Hunting" might very well be the Odell catch of movies. Will drives on and I sit and ponder as to where GWH stacks up amongst the all time greats but Al Michaels voice “That might be the greatest catch I’ve ever seen” rings through my ears and I realize just as he did, there’s no reason to include the words ‘might be’.

Logistics, Description, Spreadsheet System

Good Will Hunting – 9.7

Release Year: 1997

Time: 2h 6m

Rating - R

Streaming: Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, Youtube, Hulu

Genre: Thriller/Romance

Director: Gus Van Sant

Cast: Robin Williams, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Minnie Driver, Stellan Skarsgård

This deeply moving tale of a young genius grappling with his past and potential is as inspiring as it is emotional. Matt Damon and Robin Williams deliver career-best performances, with a script that's both witty and poignant. The movie holds s tier status because of the intricate web of relationships surrounding Will and his destined path for greatness; Robin Williams, Ben Affleck, Minnie Driver and Stellan Skarsgård, aka witty and wisdomatic therapist Sean Maguire, charismatic best friend Chuckie, British Harvard girlfriend Skylar, and brilliant mathematician Professor Lambeau, all add a different perspective for the orphan golden boy to take into consideration as he determines the foundation for the rest of his life. The heartwarming, intellectual, and emotionally charged voyage into the depths of the human psyche offers a chance to witness the transformative journey of a poor young genius. This cinematic gem uncovers the raw beauty hidden within the complexities of the human mind, so, pull up a chair and join the therapeutic tête-à-tête, for in this poignant tale, the chalkboard scribblings of mathematics become the backdrop to a profound exploration of love, friendship, and self-discovery.

Expert Quotes

“GWH lowkey just has that, best film ever produced, kind of feeling to it. Can’t really put my finger on why but that shit just hits diffy”
“You likely need to be checked out mentally if you're not rooting for the genius degenerate in Will Hunting. The homegrown orphan was clearly meant for greatness in some capacity. It’s great to watch him actualize his potential because of his chill psychologist and intimate lover girl”
“Damon’s intricate relationships with Robin Williams, Ben Afflack and Skylar serve as the foundation for this inspiring motion picture, but it’s the nuanced duo of the introspective psychologist Sean Maguire and brilliant mathematician Professor Lambeau that takes this movie from great to elite”.
“It’s the best movie of all time because of the CHATS. chatability has long been the best ability and GWH’s spot on the Mount Rushmore of TopChatSociety has likewise cemented its spot in the list of the best movies of all time”
“The 3 front war between Skylar (love), his boys (simple boston lifestyle) and Maguire & Lambeau (therapist/professor pushing him toward actualizing his life and abilities with differing values) serve as an eclectic mix of perspectives for Will to consider in his life pursuits”.

Rating - 9.7

Current Platforms - Max, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Youtube, Vudu, AppleTV

Best Clips + Quotes + Trailer

Wicked Smaht, Do you like Apples?, Meeting #1, When did you know she was the one for you?, Do You Love Me,The NSA Rant, Iconic Words of Advice, Jerry v Sean, Good Termination, Jerry & Sean, It's Not Your Fault, A Bittersweet Ending, Trailer