Stereotypes In Good Will Hunting

Good Will Hunting
The world is made up of stereotypes, and within those stereotypes there are often times different classes. In the America that we live in, there are three general classes. The upper class is thought to be snobby people who think that they are too good for any of the other classes. Middle class is considered to be the average American, a majority of citizens would consider themselves middle-class. Then there is lower class, people who have to work multiple jobs and still might not make as much money as they desire, or even need to live. The movie, Good Will Hunting, is based around the upper class, and the lower class. Will works as a janitor at MIT who is unexpectedly extremely smart, although he never applied himself. Will

gives us as viewers a fantasy that the lower class can overcome the upper class, and it makes the middle class side with Will.

He is the underdog, and everybody likes the underdogs in movies. Will makes many bad decisions, like beating people up, and they are overlooked by the viewer because we are on Will’s side and we want him to show up the snobby upper class people, like Professor Lambeau. The professor uses will’s knowledge to make himself, and the upper class, look better, and viewers see that, making us want Will to do well in spite of them.
Professor Lambeau is a mathematics professor at MIT. Being that he is well of and is very fortunate. He is a very intelligent mathematician and is considered upper class. In the beginning of the movie he puts an extremely hard equation on the board outside of his classroom for a student to solve, that gets solved but Will. One of the professor’s students, a young attractive woman, tries to ask

him who solved the equation but before she even gets to do so he hits on her. As the middle class watches this unfold we think that the upper class are rude and maybe even pigs. The stereotype being displayed in this scene is that the upper class can do whatever they want and won’t get in any trouble because their money can get them out of any problem that they have. Another time we get turned off to professor Lambeau and the upper class is when him and Sean, his old college roommate, are together to talk about Will. The professor brings up how he has a medal that he earned for being good at math, and Sean tells him off because, “I don’t give a shit about your medal. Because I knew you before you were a mathematical God.” And then Lambeau tells Sean It’s not his fault how his life turned out, when in reality Sean was never blaming him for anything, because it’s not all about him. This makes us dislike the professor Lambeau and the upper class even more, because Sean was just trying to have a conversation about his patient and instead he was being ridiculed for not going on to be a “mathematical God.” We, as the viewer, dislike professor Lambeau because of all the stereotypical upper class things that he does, we like that Will is smarter than him, even though he may be a work in progress.
In the film, the bad things that the lower class does are overlooked because we are trained to like them regardless of their wrong doings. We have a fantasy that the lower class can overcome the upper class even if they misbehave. There is a scene in the court room that states that Will has been to court at least 6 other times. Each time will has spoken on behalf of himself and talked his way out by citing old cases similar to his own. Although he has been to court so many times and for so many things, the viewer’s look past that because we want to like Will. We like him for that fact that he is gifted and can do something with his gift to show the snobby upper class that they aren’t the only smart people on this planet. There is another time when Will and his brothers go to a bar and Chuckie tries to hit on a Harvard student. He tries to sound knowledgeable but quickly gets shut down by an actual Harvard undergrad named Clarke. Clarke thinks he’s funny because he puts Chuckie down with all his book knowledge. Will then comes out of nowhere and surprises his brothers by showing Clarke up, because of how smart he is. His brothers didn’t even know Will was that smart, everyone was surprised. Clarke is considered upper class, and we enjoy that Will stands up to him, because he is proving our fantasy true.
The same night Will showed up Clarke in the bar he met a Harvard student named Skylar. Skylar gave Will her number, and from that moment they got along well. Wills friends and family wanted to meet Skylar but of course he did not show her off to them because in his mind she was considered upper class, because she went to Harvard. Will was unaware of the fact that Skylar was not your typical upper class Harvard student. The only reason Skylar had money was because she inherited it from her deceased father. Although we still do not like the upper class because of people like the Professor and Clarke, we like Skylar. Will and Skylar begin to date, and Will starts to get scared off because he doesn’t want Skylar to know about his terrible, lower class past. They get into a fight and hoping that he will stay, Skylar opens up to Will about her past, and how she’s different from the rest of the upper class. She has the same burden as Will does, because she is stereotyped as much as he is. Viewers understand that Skylar is in pain, and isn’t like the rest of the upper class, but we still relate to the lower class better.
We do not only relate to the lower class, but also Will.

He shows us that you do not need to be upper class to be as smart as someone in it. We like Will for his “I don’t care” attitude, and how he tells people in the upper class how it is. Will does some not-so-great things because of that attitude. Like when he told Professor Lambeau that the problems he was giving him were too easy, and they were problems Lambeau couldn’t even dream of solving. Will then proceeded to burn the problems because, well, he didn’t care. He wanted Lambeau to know that he was the smarter one in the relationship no matter their different classes. We like that Will did this because he stuck it to the upper class, and literally left the professor weeping over some math

problems.
Throughout the film, Good Will Hunting, each class is stereotyped. The upper class is rich, and gets to do whatever they want because of it. The lower class is poor, and has to work mindless jobs because they are not considered to be smart. The main character Will is an underdog and a secret genius that is rooted for the entire movie. Viewers want him to show up the snobby rich upper class. Will does just that with his quick wit and unbelievable knowledge. The middle class movie goers are trained to identify with Will because he is the underdog, and he does not come from money. The viewers are also encouraged to dislike the elites, because in the film they are made out to be horrible, rude, snobby people. The film portrayed this clearly no matter all the bad things that Will may have done. Everybody loves an underdog.