The story focuses on a young man named Will Hunting. Despite his high intelligence, he works as a janitor at MIT. He also spends his free time drinking with his friends, Chuckie, Billy, and Morgan.

However, at some point, Will answers a graduate level math problem correctly. This leaves a good impression on the professor, Gerald Lambeau.

Unfortunately, Will does go on a bad path. He gets into a fight with some bullies. It gets bad enough that the police need to break it up.

Will assaults the officer, though. That causes him to get charged and arrested. He spends some time in a correction facility.

Sometime later, Will is released. While on parole, he produces another complicated math problem and hopes somebody can solve it. But Lambeau mistakes the question as vandalism.

Once again, Will gets in trouble. But Lambeau realizes that he wasn’t trying to vandalize—he just wanted to solve a problem.

During a certain evening, Will goes to the bar. He meets this young British woman, Skylar, who is attending Harvard. Skylar hopes that she can go to medical school afterward.

Later, Lambeau discovers that Will only works at MIT as a janitor because he is in a program for parolees. Will also appears in court and finds out how he can avoid jailtime. That is to do more math under Lambeau’s supervision and attend psychotherapy sessions.

Will agrees to do those things. However, he doesn’t always cooperate in his therapy sessions.

Desperate for help, Lambeau contacts his old classmate, Sean Maguire. Will begins seeing Sean for his therapy sessions.

During the first meeting, Will learns that Sean’s wife died a long time ago. Will also says something about Sean’s deceased spouse that angers him to the point where Sean gets kind of physical. Sean forces Will to never speak about his wife like that again.

The next several sessions between Will and Sean do improve, though. Sean even moves on from the remark Will had said about his wife.

Aside from seeing Sean, Will also dates Skylar. So far, their times together go well. But Sean does lie about his background to her.

When Will sees Sean again, he tells him how he met his wife. After that, Will introduces Skylar to his friends. They have fun together.

Lambeau tries to help Will find jobs and even sets up interviews for him. However, he turns them all down.

Stakes continue to rise with Will and those he knows. When Skylar says that she plans to move to California, Will gets angry. He also confesses that he lied about his background and shares the tough life he had, including becoming an orphan and being abused by his foster father.

Regardless of how Skylar really loves him, Will breaks up with her. The poor lady leaves in tears.

If that’s not bad enough, Will screws up with his friends and even Sean. Sean decides to quit seeing him.

Can things be fixed, though.

I will admit that this movie did not engage me as much as I hoped. Aside from it being mostly boring, the plot was also hard to follow. Once again, I used Wikipedia to help me narrate some of the post’s first half. Of course, all my words are my own.

The pacing was also slow. I felt that too many scenes lagged.

On the bright side, there were perks in this film. For instance, the premise was strong. Even though Will didn’t always do the right thing, he did remain likable.

Sean was a good therapist, as well. He was played by Robin Williams, who nailed the part as a kind, but serious character.

In fact, because Sean was portrayed by Robin Williams, he was more enjoyable. There is even a scene where Will hugged Sean and cried. Although that is generally supposed to be sweet, it felt a little peculiar for a client to hug their therapist while he sobbed. No offense to anyone who’s done that—it may be more common than I imagine.

I also found it interesting that Skylar was English. However, it is never explained why in the movie. But there is a UK flag in her room when she and Will are making love together.

Skylar was a good character, as well. So were Will’s friends, although they weren’t exactly the most distinguishable in personalities.

One part that I found strange was how Will was able to go to the bar and drink while still 20 years old. And this movie is set in the US—unless Will had a fake ID and got away with underage drinking.

Overall, Good Will Hunting was just okay. The excessive swearing did make it a little better, especially with increasing tension.

Yes, this movie is rated R. So, it is obviously not for kids.

Anyway, I give this film 3 out of 5 stars.