#1243 in our old book database. Rated: Good ( )

I'll grant that reading a screenplay is quite a change-up from novels, but I liked this movie, and the book caught my eye at Goodwill (which by itself is an interesting coincidence).

The story is that of a young math wizard who is hiding his talent under a mop in a bucket full of dirty water. Working as a janitor at M.I.T., Will Hunting, not yet 21, comes upon a blackboard on which a professor has written a math challenge for his students to try to solve for extra credit. Will picks up the chalk and quickly writes the solution. Everyone is gobsmacked. Who did this? Who solved it? No one knows, but the professor wants to find out.

The guy who solved it, as well as subsequently posted challenges, is an orphan, physically and mentally abused by foster parents, with a public-school education (if that), living in a rented room in South Boston, and hangin' out with three unskilled, directionless friends. Much beer is consumed in corner taverns; occasionally there's a fight. Will has a police record, and his most recent fight is going to land him in the pokey. Until the professor intercedes with a plan to keep Will working his math genius while getting behavioral/psychological counseling. And so it goes.

Damon and Affleck created the script for themselves and shopped it around filmland. Optioned and produced, it was not only a box office success, it garnered Oscars for the writers and an Oscar for Robin Williams' performance as a psychologist, left adrift by the death of his wife, who helps Will (and himself).