The 1990s was a decade that was replete with outstanding movies. Some think it’s the best movie decade of all time, and when looking at offerings like Good Will Hunting, it’s easy to see what people believe that.
Good Will Hunting is a timeless movie that nearly didn’t get made. The film was based on Damon’s real life experience, and while he and Affleck didn’t make much for it, it changed their lives forever.
The film featured scenes of Damon’s character solving intense math problems, but were they actually that difficult? Let’s learn the truth about the math problems from the movie!
Good Will Hunting Is A Classic
In 1997, Good Will Hunting officially hit theaters, and that film, which was directed by Gus Van Sant, flipped the script and changed the game for several notable Hollywood performers.
Starring Robin Williams, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, and a host of other talented performers, the small film generated a ton of hype upon its release. People could not stop buzzing about how great this movie was, and this was instrumental in the movie going on to gross over $220 million at the global box office.
Eventually, all the positive buzz surrounding the movie propelled it to being nominated and winning some of the most prestigious awards in the industry. At the 70th Academy Awards, the picture would take home two Oscars: a Best Supporting Actor win for Robin Williams, and the award for Best Original Screenplay, which was given to Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.
To this day, Good Will Hunting is still considered one of the greatest films of the 1990s, which is truly saying a lot. That decade boasts a plethora of outstanding films, and any person wanting the decade’s best needs to give this one a watch.
Like any great movie, the film features a number of moments that are legitimately great.
It Has Many Memorable Moments
If you have seen Good Will Hunting, then you can probably pinpoint several things that have stuck with you throughout the years. Many of the scenes have lived on in pop culture lore, and some lines have continued to be quoted to this very day.
ScreenRant did an excellent write-up on the best quotes from the movie, and there was no way that we could personally touch on it without highlighting arguably the most famous line from the movie.
“Well, I got her number. How do you like them apples” is a classic line, and as the site pointed out, “In a movie with so many powerful and thought-provoking lines, it is strange how its silliness line gets the most attention. After Will embarrasses the Harvard student, he meets Skylar and hits it off with her.”
There are plenty of other lines and moments that we can highlight, but because there are so many, we would basically just have to do a full length review of the film, scene by scene.
Will solving out the math problems is both memorable and a crucial part of the film. As you can imagine, movie fans have long wondered about the legitimacy of the math problems that Will worked out in the movie. Turns out, some smart minds have taken a look at what was done in the movie, and the result might be a bit surprising to fans.
The Truth About The Math Problems
So, what exactly is the truth behind the math problems that fans watched Will solve in Good Will Hunting? People have asked this question before, and a Reddit user was able to bluntly shed some light on it.
“It was all real, but none of it was actually very difficult. The “incredibly hard” blackboard problem could be solved by a student who just learned what graphs were in an afternoon or so, for example,” they wrote.
For the uninformed, the problem certainly looked daunting. However, a closer inspection did reveal that the problem itself was not too difficult, especially for people attending such a prestigious school like the students in the movie.
In that same thread, another user talked about another infamous math problem, though this time, it was from Russell Crowe’s outstanding film, A Beautiful Mind.
“On the flipside, the blackboard problem from “A Beautiful Mind” was pretty wild an legitimately interesting mathematics,” the user wrote.
Even though the math problem that Will solve in Good Will Hunting was not difficult in actuality, the movie still does an outstanding job of helping audiences suspend their belief while watching the scene.