Review of Good Will Hunting (1997) by Gamzguy17 — 21 Aug 2021

The film has good intentions and ideas where they are best depicted in amazing scenes involving Matt Damon as the titular character and Robin Williams as professor Sean McGuire (in his best dramatic role).

Their chemistry is very strong and the ideas and values they talk about are both fascinating and engaging. I wish that this whole film's plot could've just solely been about these two, but disappointingly, the screenplay written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck is too incompetent (it's a good thing they stuck to acting I suppose).

In between the thought-provoking scenes involving Damon and Williams is a cliché-ridden story told with characters that are not engaging nor have enough backstory for us, the audience, to care about.

All I need to say is that it is a romance plot with the titular character and a girl and there's a misunderstood fight between them and....ugh....yeah. It's that same old 'song and dance' we all achingly know.

In fact, the effect the film had on me was a tug-of-war, pulling me back and forth between smart characters with smart dialogue and dumb characters with dumb dialogue. I'm teetering on the fence for "Good Will Hunting".

I want to like this film, but I just can't stomach its amateur plot peppered with intelligent scenes. It (sadly) comes across as Hollywood trying to relate with the smart crowd and failing, which in turn, makes for a phony film.