The film I have chosen to analyze is Good Will Hunting, released on December 5, 1997 and was directed by Gus Van Sant. This film is an indie drama/romance film about a boy named Will Hunting who has a genius level IQ but chooses to work as a janitor at MIT. He lives alone in a sparsely furnished apartment in a poor neighborhood of South Boston. Because he was an abused foster child, he subconsciously blames himself for his unhappy upbringing and is unable to maintain either a stable job or a stable romantic relationship. When he solves a difficult college-level math problem, his talent is discovered by Professor Gerald Lambeau who decides to help Will Hunting reach his potential. When Will is arrested for assaulting a police officer, realizing that he may have the potential to become a great mathematician, Lambeau goes to Will's trial and intervenes on his behalf, offering him a choice: either Will can go to prison, or he can be arrested. released under Lambeau's personal supervision, where he must study mathematics and see a psychotherapist to help him with his anger and defensive personality. Will chooses to go with Lambeau even though he believes he doesn't actually need therapy. After five psychologists fail to get through to Will, Lambeau finally asks Sean Maguire to help counsel him. Sean differs from the other five therapists in that he is also from South Boston and stands up to Will and eventually gets to him and his hostile, sarcastic defense mechanisms. In a later session, Will is a bit shocked when Sean tells him how he gave up his ticket to see the Red Sox in the 1975 World Series to meet and spend time with a stranger at a bar, who would later become his wife. Will is encouraged to try to form a relationship with Skylar, a young woman he met at a bar near Harvard. After much conflict, Sean eventually leaves to travel the world, but not before reconciling with Lambeau. The film ends with proof that Will has left for a better life as he travels to California for a new start with Skylar and a leap into an unpredictable future. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Moving on to the actual analysis, the film opens with nice sounding music as it shows multiple different books open on the ground along with multiple complex mathematical problems. It also shows the main character played by Matt Damon reading these books that are shown. All of this is done while the cast members are still being shown. During each shot the camera appears to pan across each shot and in terms of effects everything shown has a certain transparency and fades in and out of each shot, including Will Hunting, who is reflected on the screen along with the math problems with most of the shots were close-ups of his face or extreme close-ups of his eyes. This type of introduction immediately makes the audience understand who the film is primarily about and what is so special and unique about Will, namely his level of intelligence, before they even get to hear his name. The camera then pans to Will's room and stops. in a high angle shot in one of the corners of the room. This shot shows Will's current living conditions and his lifestyle, all he has are a few bulbs for interior lighting, a mattress in the corner of the room and a small kitchen merged together with the small living room area, a meanthat Will probably lives in a small house/condo. There is then a short montage showing a comparison shot between an elderly woman sleeping outside with only one book, while Will is wide awake and reading multiple different books that are stacked and scattered around his room. A shot of the neighborhood is shown across one of the streets as Will and his friend, played by Ben Affleck, move further away showing the area where Will lives and this shows how low his income level probably is with these living conditions. An extremely long shot of the entire city of Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts is then shown slowly moving inland. This suggests that Will most likely lives on the outskirts of the southern end of Boston. All of this information is gleaned about Will from the audience within the first four minutes of the two-hour film. Throughout the film, the director uses many still shots of a variety of close-ups, medium shots and long shots. . Most of these are used to show a new location such as MIT, the tavern where the characters hang out, or the building of the therapist, Sean Maguire; or they are used internally on each character to show their individual reactions/expressions to a certain event. The film's editing is rapid, moving from one shot or scene to another in an instant, there's never much time for a dissolve or some other slow cut. In this regard, most of the scenes seem to be quite long with some being quite shorter than others. For example, the therapy sessions, or any other moments where Will and Sean are together, are one of the scenes that last longer than the others; I guess the reason for this is to constantly remind and show the audience the growing bond between the two characters and how important the relationship with both characters is to the film, as it mostly depends on and revolves around the connection that Will and Sean have. In a way, the relationship between Will and Sean, at least for me, can be linked to a father-son relationship; Over the course of the film, it seems that Will begins to look at Sean as a father figure as he learns more and more about his personal life and difficult times and begins to realize the importance of his life and that he should take control of his own. life, making something of himself instead of doing what others want him to do, like Professor Lambeau. On the other hand, throughout the film it seems that Sean sees Will as a son, which can be shown multiple times when Sean tries to protect Will by trying to convince Lambeau not to force Will into a decision he doesn't want to make. Sean tries his best to convince Lambeau that Will should lead his own life and do whatever he wants and be free. Additionally, with Will and Sean growing up with abusive childhoods, Will may see Sean as the father he never had, and Sean may try to be a better father figure to Will than his father was to him. of the lighting used in Good Will Hunting, is sometimes used to represent the differences in socioeconomic status between Will's lifestyle and that of others. For example, in environments like Will's personal home, the janitor's office where he works, and the South Boston Bar he often visits, they are all dimly lit environments that feel more desolate than places like MIT, Sean's office, or the places where Lambeau for Will which, on the contrary, are generally brighter and the colors seem more evident overall. To show the wealth and higher social class of these places there is a warmer looking effect compared to the darker looking effects in Will's lifestylepoorer and lower social class. As previously mentioned, the use of light in this way indicates differences in socioeconomic status and the opportunities, or lack thereof, that status has. Additionally, throughout much of the film, Gus Van Sant uses a lot of natural colors to create a sense of empathy, or sympathy, for Will that the audience feels. In places where Will seems more comfortable or happy, the colors are warmer and more inviting to the audience. For example, there are multiple scenes where Will is in Skylar's room at Harvard or in Sean's office and the color has an amber appearance, which happens to be the color of the film's cover and is the dominant color. that Gus Van Sant uses to represent in the film Will. This allows the audience to see Will for who he truly is instead of the nice-kid persona he manages to put on when around other people. Another example of natural colors used in this film is that whenever Will is under his identity, like in the famous scene where Will first meets Sean in his office, the color changes from warm to cool whenever Will begins to analyze the artistic style of a painting that hangs in the window. As Will analyzes the painting, he is also analyzing Sean's life and as he gets closer and closer to the painting, the light becomes colder and colder until he finishes his speech; later, the sunlight shines more brightly in the scene, which causes Will to have a different expression, therefore creating a mood change within the frame. The editing of Good Will Hunting was very good in that, as noted before, it used a sort of kaleidoscope effect for Will in the film's opening credits while also including montage to establish Will's character; instead of the normal quick cuts used in the film, Gus Van Sant uses the kaleidoscope effect to move from one shot to another. Another editing technique used by Gus Van Sant in the film can be seen whenever he cut to other characters even if they were not speaking; for example, there is a sort of parallel montage used whenever Will is at the arcade with some of his friends and then suddenly there is a shot of Lambeau and Sean in a restaurant having a drink while talking about Will , which suggests that the two experiences happen at the same time and fit together. There are multiple examples where this type of editing is used in film; some examples include scenes such as, at the end of the film, when Will leaves, but leaves a note when Sean parallels Chuckie in Will's apartment. Another is when Skylar is at the airport waiting for Will to arrive and then cuts to Will sitting on a park bench watching the planes leave, creating the feeling that even though they both want to be together, they won't end up together. . Another scene that uses this is when Will is interviewing for the National Security Council and starts telling a story, but then it cuts to Will's face in Sean's office telling the same story. This type of editing is used well to create a continuation of events within the same sequence of shots or scenes. Another editing technique I noticed is very subtle, but a good use of using a sound effect. At the beginning of the film, during the bird's eye view of the city, the ringing of the school bell is synchronized with the cuts of the different shots, going from the bird's eye view, to a shot of a bridge, to a shot of the front of MIT While this is a very subtle editing technique, I think it's a nice touch to indicate changes between different shots or scenes. The actors of Good Will Hunting do a jobphenomenal at portraying the personality of their characters. Everything from their spoken language, to their facial expressions, postures, and even their clothing style represents the type of character they are, and it's easy for the audience to pick up on most of these things. For example, returning to socioeconomic status, Professor Lambeau uses more sophisticated language than Will or Sean, saying Perrier instead of club soda. Professor Lambeau also doesn't swear as much as Sean or Will and his friends would. This makes Lambeau stand out as an individual who likes to show off his level of education or intelligence and also shows that he is most likely a highly respected professor and holds a higher social status than other people. Someone like Sean would be from a lower middle class and often swears at times. On the opposite side of the spectrum, Will and his friends use very informal language with a lot of swearing at each other and work in a low-key manner. job with income. However, Will, throughout the film, shows that he uses a mix of casual and sophisticated language and is able to switch between them without a second thought. There are many instances where Will does this throughout the film, but my favorite is about 15-20 minutes into the film, whenever Will and his friends go to a Harvard bar and Will shows his intelligence to one of the students who was making fun of himself. of Chuckie reciting the text of a book the student was copying. Next, Will gets Skylar's number and in the next scene Will sees the student sitting in a Dunkin' Donuts and Will goes to the window, shows Skylar's number and says I got her number, how do you like those apples. clothes worn by the characters, Will mostly wears a dirty, torn t-shirt with jeans and sometimes a rugged jacket, which once again shows his poor socio-economic status; Sean mostly wears a simple button-down shirt with khakis showing his average socioeconomic status; and Lambeau mostly wears a suit and tie or a jacket with a scarf showing his rich and high socio-economic status. Going into the subjective point of view of some characters, I would start with Will. From Will's perspective, I think he obviously knows how smart he is and isn't afraid to show it when he feels the need to, but he's afraid to commit to a better lifestyle, although that could just be that he doesn't think school is needed and is fine where he is, so I think he probably doesn't like change very much and likes things the way they are and is fine with the current life he has. From his perspective, at first, he is doing everything to stay out of prison and get along with Lambeau, but as time goes on and he spends more time with Sean, Will begins to see the value that life has and he is willing to apply himself more than he did before. From Sean's perspective, he sees Will's potential differently than Lambeau and believes that instead of forcing Will into a life he doesn't necessarily want, they should let him find his own path and do what he wants; saying that there is more to life than a field medal and that Lambeau is manipulative. This can be explained during two scenes, one where Lambeau and Sean meet in a bar about an hour and 15 minutes into the film, and another during an argument between the two about an hour and 45 minutes into the film. minutes into the film. As you could probably understand, from Lambeau's point of view he wants Will to be pretty much like him and like one of the greatest mathematicians changing the world with his gift, forcing him to live and trying to take him under his wing. The point or moral of Good Will Hunting would be to not let them, 3(4), 292-316.