Good Will Hunting : a 1997 film directed by Gus Van Sant, based on a script by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, starring Matt Damon (Will Hunting), Robin Williams (Sean Maguire), Ben Affleck (Chuckie Sullivan) and Minnie Driver (Skylar).
The film’s setting:
The action takes place in Boston, which is a big city in the North East of the US. It is one of the oldest city in the US. Two sociological facts about Boston are important for the action in the movie:
1. Two of the most famous universities in the world are situated in Boston: Harvard (where Skylar is studying) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (where Will Hunting works as a janitor at the beginning of the film).
2. Boston is home to a very large community of people of Irish descent, that immigrated to the city in the 19th and 20th centuries. Will Hunting, as all of his friends, are Irish-American. They all live in South Boston, which is a working class Irish-American neighbourhood. Maguire (played by Robin Williams), who is the psychiatrist of Will Hunting, also grew up in South Boston.
1. First sequence: the class culture of the Irish-American working class of South Boston (2′ to 15’40 »)
Question 1: What kind of jobs are Will and his friends doing?
Question 2: After work, what kind of activities do they have?
Question 3: How do they interact with each other?
Question 4: How would you describe the relations between the communities in Will’s neighbourhood?
primary/secondary socialization: socialisation primaire/secondaire
janitor: agent d’entretien, gardien
working class : la classe ouvrière
neighbourhood: quartier
to be of Irish descent: to have ancestors that come from Ireland
2. Second sequence: Will refuses to get into the upper class (1 19′ to 1 39′)
Summary of the film between the two sequences: Will Hunting is sentenced to two years of imprisonment. However his maths professor at MIT finds out about it and persuades the judge to give him a suspended sentence instead. But the deal is that Will has to study mathematics with his teacher, and has to go to a psychiatrist (Sean Maguire, who is played by Robin Williams). Will Hunting turns out to be a maths genius. He gets many very prestigious job offers. But he refuses all of them, and prefers to get back to working class jobs with his friends.
He meets a Harvard student (Skylar) and starts a relationship with her. She’s English and comes from the upper class.
Question 1: What does Will refuse?
Question 2: What are the justifications he gives?
Question3: What are the real reasons of his refusal?
to be sentenced to: être condamné à
suspended sentence : condamnation avec sursis
upper class : classe supérieure