Good Will Hunting

This past weekend, I watched a movie. Not just any movie: an awesome movie. Not just any awesome movie. I watched Good Will Hunting. For all of you people who have never seen this movie, you need to drive to your local Blockbuster or Redbox right now. Yeah now. Get up off your butt and go. This movie was so great. It was about this guy, Will Hunting (Matt Damon), who is a mathematical genius and has a photographic memory, but is troubled and has some run-ins with the law. He works as a janitor and answers a professor's (Lambeau's) really hard math question and the professor finds him. The professor makes a deal with the judge who is the head of Will's trial for hitting a cop that Will has to do math with him and see a therapist. After seeing therapists and none of them wanting to see him because of his obnoxiousness, he goes to see Sean (Robin Williams), a friend of  Lambeau, who takes him on. Sean tries to help him figure out where he belongs in the world and point him in the right direction. The movie is about the relationships he has with Lambeau, Sean, Skylar (his girlfriend, played by Minnie Driver), and Chuckie (his best friend, played by Ben Affleck). What makes this movie is the characterization. The writers, actors, and director did a great job showing the complexities of each character. No wonder it was up for nine oscars. It only one two though because that was the year Titanic came out. Enough said. But it deserved those two it got: best supporting actor for Robin Williams and best original screenplay for Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. The movie's tagline says it all: " Some people can never believe in themselves, until someone believes in them." See the movie and you'll get it. The fact that the movie is funny too makes it even more likable. One of the funniest parts is when Will totally shows a guy up in the bar while he is trying to impress some girls by making a fool out of Chuckie. Will gets one of the girls' numbers. As he is walking out of the bar, he passes by a restaurant where Mr. Smartypants is sitting and talking to a group of people. Will bangs on the window and asks him, "Do you like apples?" The guy says, "yeah." Will then says, "Well, I got her number. How ya like them apples?" When he said that, I burst into laughter. I am just waiting for an opportunity to use that. When the time comes, it is going to be hilarious. Another funny part was when he was the therapy scene when he called one therapist gay and started singing "Afternoon Delight" while he was supposed to be hypnotized by another therapist. So anyway, this was a great, very inspirational movie. What I got out of it was that even the smartest people need a little help sometimes. This is a really important and true message. No one can go through life alone- they need someone to lean on and understand what they have gone through. This is what Sean was for Will and why I love this movie so much. It is tied as my favorite movie with The Shawshank Redemption. The ending makes it. It's like a cherry on top. And the song playing at the end ("Afternoon Delight") has the perfect melody for the ending's mood. And it was sung earlier in the movie, making the ending sentimental and a little comical for those who remember that part. If you ever see me chuckling in class, Kirky, it just might be because I'm thinking about a part from this movie. This is just one of those movies I will never forget. 

"Good Will Hunting" 's poster, just in case you couldn't tell.

Gone Baby Gone

Okay, my mind was just blown. BLOWN. Even more blown than when I first read the poster outside of Mr. Cecere's room that says that the mirror image of 3.14 is Pie. I just watched "Gone Baby Gone" with my mom during "Friday Night Movie Night With Mom" and... whoa. I have been wanting to see this movie for a while, and I just watched it and... whoa. SPOILER ALERT: If you have not seen this movie and want to, then DO NOT continue reading this blog. If you don't care about seeing the movie (which I advise that you do), then proceed. That is the most screwed up situation, crime, whatever you want to call it. SCREWED UP. I thought that the movie would have some kind of ending with closure for the family, like most movies do: them finding the girl's body or finding her alive somewhere. But I did not expect the Police Chief to be in on it! Are you kidding me?!?! But that makes sense, seeing as how his daughter was murdered... He wanted a child so badly, to fill the empty whole in his heart from the loss of his daughter, and when the perfect situation arose, (him wanting a daughter, a little girl needing a good home) he took it.

Also, I felt that there were pros and cons to what Patrick did in the end, and I understand why he did what he did. I understand that Amanda should be returned to her mother, where she belongs and I understood his whole speech to Morgan Freeman about the girl coming to him years later and saying, "why did you leave me with my kidnappers?" but I think that I would have left Amanda with Morgan Freeman. She would have had a better life with people who really loved her. Now, I know that her mother did love her, but Morgan Freeman would have REALLY loved her and ensured that she had a good future, whereas, living with her mother, that wasn't a promise.

Apart from the f-bombs being dropped every five seconds, this movie was pretty good. Using Kirky's elements of great films, I would say that this is a 3 out of 4: it hits 3 out of the 4 elements on the list. It failed to be unique. Yes, it was unique in its really twisted plot, but there are a ton of twisted crime movies out nowadays. This movie was incredibly layered and highly crafted, it definitely transported me (unlike the recent Twilight movie), and this movie has a weighty theme that most people can probably relate to. That is that people do what they think is right in the moment, not thinking about the consequences. Lionel, Remy and Doyle (Morgan Freeman) did what they thought was right for Amanda, not thinking about the effects it would have on those around them. I do admit though, I understand why they did what they did. This movie and its theme made me realize to always think about the consequences of something wrong that you do, even if you do it for a moral reason.

Slumdog Millionare

So this weekend I watched Slumdog Millionare. It was ok. I liked how it flashed back and forth; that was neat. I didn't really like the part where it showed the people blinding the kids. That was awful. I thought that it was funny when the little boys were giving tour guide at the Taj Mahal and how they were stealing peoples' shoes. I thought that the ending was good. I do not know if I would have given it best picture of the year, but it wasn't up to me, and I'm not an expert on movies. The four characteristics of great movies are uniqueness, highly crafted and layered, they achieve what they set out to do, and takes on a complex theme. This movie is unique, with its flashbacks, highly crafted, also the flashbacks, make the audience happy in the end (which was what the moviemakers wanted to happen), and takes on a complex theme, this one being "never stop looking for true love." I liked The Shawshank Redemption a lot better... :)