The film Good Will Hunting follows the story of a janitor, Will Hunting, working at MIT with a secret gift for advanced mathematics. After being arrested during a street fight, Will is given an ultimatum; either go serve time in prison, or work under the tutelage of Professor Gerald Lambeau, who discovered his talent for proofs. Begrudgingly, Will decides to work with Lambeau, but pushes back constantly against the professor’s attempts to help him. The film is an excellent example of interpersonal communications and the concepts within it, as well as when those concepts fail. One of the prevailing themes in the film was the perception of identity. The way we perceive ourselves is crucial in how we interact with others. Will has incredibly low self esteem, which also affects his self worth. His case is one of nurture, not nature, since he …show more content…
Sean is mocked and persecuted by Lambeau for never advancing far in his career or winning any awards, despite being as smart as the professor. What Lambeau fails to realize is that Sean never wanted to do those things in his life, and he was content with getting married and helping people through counseling. Instead of seeing this, Lambeau only saw Sean’s unwillingness to force Will to work at a college or white collar job as a projection of his own failures. Will also stereotypes Skylar as a self serving rich girl fooling around, not realising that she would give everything back for another day with her father. These notions based on little fact and quick judgements complicate relationships and show more about the people making them than those to whom they are about. The film Good Will Hunting tends to highlight most of the negative sides of communicating and its components, such as bad self image and harmful stereotypes. Despite this, many of the characters overcome these difficulties, allowing for positive outcomes of their relationships with others as well as with