In the movie, Unforgiven, William Munny is a reformed outlaw who takes on the role of the hero in the twisted landscape of Big Whiskey. The normal characterization of a hero portrays a character exempt from the temptation of evil, and shines as a light in the darkness for the society. However, within Unforgiven the movie perverts the idea of a hero, and shapes it to meet the personality of Will Munny. After countless years of rampage and lawlessness, Will turned in his evilness for a family life and the opportunity to raise children with his wife. However, his wife is taken by some illness and Munny was now left alone to care for his two children; struggling to survive. One day, a young man by the name of the Schofield Kid offers him a chance to journey off to kill two criminals, who cut up an “innocent” women, for a reward. Munny, who needs the money desperately grudgingly agrees to help, but …show more content…
Will risks his own well-being for his partners when the Sheriff, Little Bill, attacks him for carrying a gun into town, which is against the law. Will not only takes the beating for them, but he also purposefully lies about what they have on them, even after being badly beaten. This shows Will’s heroic traits in that he has no limits when it comes to defending his friends and the mission’s integrity; moreover, this also demonstrates the tyranny of the Sheriff over the town which is handled later on. Will also shows his heroism in a subtle yet significant way, after he had shot the first wanted man, he is still conscious and crying out for water to be brought to him. Will yells off to his entourage to get him a drink of water, showing that Will still has humanity and cares for the people within the society. These two examples show the important and vastly differently traits that will has compared to the sinful actions of everyone else in the
Good Will Hunting is the graceful tale of a young gentleman’s struggle to find out where he belongs in the world, by first finding out who he himself is. In this film, Matt Damon takes on the role of a disturbed genius that has a keen understanding of the deepness of human character. The film is a voyage through the mind of Will Hunting as he is required to undergo psychotherapy as an alternative to serving jail time. With the assistance of a psychologist, played by Robin Williams, Will learns about himself and recognizes his individual worth in the world by comprehending what is most important to him in his own life. This motion picture serves as a source of superb example for film technique. Gus Van Sant’s directing ability joined with the writing skills of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, who also plays Will’s best buddy, Chuckie, is a vibrant mixture of technical features used to induce sentiment and compassion amongst the viewers of this heart-warming film. Characteristics of the color, angles, shots, camera movement, editing, and distortions are all each particularly noteworthy to the general composition of Van Sant’s Good Will Hunting.
What is a Hero? A hero is a mythological or legendary figure often of godly descent endowed with great strength or ability or power (Merriam-Webster). A hero is also the one who displays great courage (Merriam-Webster). So there is no one way to characterize a hero, but one hero that is widely agreed upon of being extraordinary and is admired widely is the Homeric Hero. A Homeric Hero is a hero who processes strength, knowledge, power, courage, skill, and honor. In the film Hudsucker Proxy the Coen brothers create the character Norville Barnes represent the Homeric hero Odysseus. This suggests that the character had to go through a hero 's journey and obtains new relationships.
Stories of heroes have been a source of inspiration and awe for as long as people could tell them. We look to legends of great men and women who have accomplished grand tasks in hopes that we, too, may one day be as tremendous as them. Indeed, most of us do; albeit not in the way we imagine. Most of them slip by us unnoticed, overlooked, and will never be the protagonists of epic stories. So what exactly makes a hero? I believe a hero to be anyone who possesses the qualities of a hero: courageous, perseverant and compassionate – all of which Abraham Lincoln perfectly demonstrates.
Heroes are often described as physically attractive, strong, intelligent figures with a flair for grand gestures,and an eloquent knack for stringing words together. The fundamental aspects of what defines a hero are conveniently glazed over. People forget that heroes often lead lives of quiet determination. When they have an idea, a goal they want to accomplish, they ignite a spark within themselves that burns into an uncontrollable blaze, which that can only be tamed by success. The fabricated image of a hero has been so deeply rooted into society that the quiet heroes in literature, such as Jefferson from A Lesson Before Dying, are often forgotten, or the misdeeds of cowards such as Frankenstein are overlooked. Jefferson is the literary foil for Victor Frankenstein, because he has strongly built morals that enable him to become a hero, whereas Victor Frankenstein is a weak willed and indecisive character. A hero is defined by their ability to go through with a task despite the obstacles that lie in their way, along with their courage and ultimately, they accept any responsibility that may befall them.
This is part of the Cognitive Dissonance Theory which works on the assumption that individuals seek consistency between expectations and reality. One scene from the movie that shows cognitive dissonance is when Will is talking to his friend best friend. Will tells him about his future of living in South Boston, and never leaving. His best friend tells him that if in twenty years Will is still living in South Boston, coming over to his house watching sports, and working construction, he will kill him. The second scene is when Will’s psychiatrist tells Will that “It’s not your fault”. (Referring to the abuse he suffered as a child). The psychiatrist repeats it five more times and after the fifth time Will is crying his arms saying he’s
“They may take away our lives, but they’ll never take away our freedom.” William Wallace is a scottish soldier very adamant about fighting for Scotland's freedom, and he cried the quote above among his soldier before going into battle. Throughout the movie Braveheart, directed by Mel Gibson, William Wallace, the main character, shows multiple different unique characteristics of heroic ability. There are two types of heroic characteristics displayed by William Wallace in this 1995, Academy Award winning film. The first one is Anglo-Saxon criteria, which consists of bravery, loyalty, generosity, and friendship. The other criteria Wallace demonstrates falls into the epic hero category, this consists of strength, ethnical sense, they need to have a goal or be on a quest, and they should be greatly glorified by the people. In Sir William Wallace’s case he presents all of these characteristic very well throughout the film.
A Shakespearean tragic hero may be defined as “an exceptional being of high degree” who contributes to his own degeneration and illustrates a personality flaw. The character of Shakespeare’s Macbeth is in all ways the perfect example of a tragic hero. His greatness and bravery in battle for his country ultimately leads him to be a great thane and eventually a powerful king, making his actions have a significant impact on a country. Macbeth’s ambition on becoming a king leads to an obsession to remain in his current position. His ambition comes to a point where he falls to the temptation of evil which leads to Macbeth’s inevitable downfall. At the beginning of the play, Macbeth is portrayed as a brave man whose performance in Scotland’s battle is celebrated.
The word hero can easily be defined as: dictionary.com defines a hero as a man of distinguishes courage or ability, admired for his brave deeds and noble qualities. Hero originates from the Greek word hḗrōes. Therefore the meaning of the word itself has been influenced from Greek, the way the meaning of the word has been influenced has come from Greek literature, for example: The Odyssey by Homer. This paper will argue how the ancient concept of heroism has influenced the American culture and what it means to be a hero. While explaining the influence, I will compare and contrast the ideas of what characteristics both ancient heroes and modern heroes possess.
Will Hunting uses many defense mechanisms to cope with his stress, anxiety, anger, and fear some example of these defense mechanisms are denial, because Will blocks his true genius potential from entering his consciousness. A second example would be sublimation, due to him satisfying his anger and stress by smoking cigarettes, which Will does frequently throughout the movie. The third example is probably one of the most common defense mechanisms, repression, Will represses the memories of his foster parent not caring about him, showing no sympathy towards him and using him as a scapegoat and abusing him physically and psychologically. We see the result of Will’s repressed memories burst into his consciousness when he sees the pictures of his bruised body, then he bursts into tears showing a lot of emotion, which from that point on, lets him begin to heal from his traumatic
hero to the extent that he is his own self and not the character that
Will Salas, played by Justin Timberlake, is a twenty-eight year old poor factory worker that lives in the ghetto of Dayton with his mother Rachel. The wealthy live in a place called New Greenwich, which Will boasts to his mother about all the time saying they will live there one day. One night after working Will goes into a bar with his friend Borel and notices a man that seems to be getting a lot of attention. The man is well groomed and dressed wearing a nice suit. After getting a closer glance of the man and his arm Will can see the that he is wealthy in time. To Will it is obvious that the man is not from Dayton and is instead from New Greenwich.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary’s definition of a hero is “a person who is admired for great or brave acts or fine qualities.” In Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad explores the way greed and jealousy seize the goodness in a man’s heart, as well as the possibility of them becoming a courageous character. In his novel, Conrad displays that although Marlow and Kurtz are perceived as heroes due to their moral and noble attributes, they are unable to become true heroes. Their lust towards power and control over land and ivory ultimately expands the desire and expansion of darkness in the hearts of people who once had good intentions.
Altruism is a form of selfless behavior that benefits others without benefiting the self. Even more extreme than altruism is heroism which is a form of altruism that requires a tremendous amount of sacrifice. In general, heroism (1) involves some type of quest , (2) some form of actual or anticipated sacrifice or risk, (3) can be passive or active, (4) can be one time or recurrent (Franco, 2011).
The word hero is tossed around on a daily basis, whether on the news, in books, or in movies, we hear it all the time. Its common usage begs the question, what exactly is a hero? Are there traits and characteristics one must possess to be classified as heroic? Our interpretation of a hero is ever-changing, constantly influenced by the stories told by the dominant culture, which acts as an invisible hand. Back in the earlier days of storytelling, heroes were more easily identifiable. Things like appearance and character tropes made it easy to distinguish heroes and villains. Nowadays, the depiction of heroes and villains are sometimes blurred, some heroes look like villains, and some villains look and act like heroes. Thus, these days,
As he slowly opened up to Sean, he didn’t realize he was slowly destroying the authority figure in his mind at the same time. The pain and blind obedience to his foster parents,though, was essentially replaced by Sean Maguire himself. Even though obedience is still taking place, the replacement was absolutely necessary because it change Will’s rebellious ways. When Will thought he had Sean all figured out by a painting he drew, his authoritarian conscious was still present. Later though, Sean completely destroyed Will’s rebellious action by revealing he knew nothing about love, art, or true happiness. He only knew what he has read in books. This was the start of Will destroying said authority figure in his mind. After the scene, Will began to open up to Sean and allowed him to teach and heal him. The healing process did heal his authoritarian conscious, but it only continued Will’s blind obedience. While he stopped obeying the inner authority in his head, Will simultaneously began obeying Sean himself. The obedience towards Sean becomes clear more towards the end of the film. The final presence of Will’s authoritarian conscience is the moment before the emotional scene when Sean tells Will, “it's not your fault” (Gus Van Sant Good Will Hunting). At this moment, Will’s obedience to his foster parents is completely gone and he no longer seeks approval or fears their disappointment. Although the obedience shifts over to Sean, Will is no longer a rebellious character fueled with anger and fear. In this case, Will is “proud of doing a good job, obeying the experimenter (Sean) under difficult circumstances” (Milgram 702). The rebel within Will is gone and his accomplishments that arrive from obeying Sean turn his life around and he is proud of it. Although the obedience figure of Sean isn’t due to evil, the obedient figure is still there, but in a