Car As a Heterotopia

In "Good Will Hunting"
Directed By Gus Van Sant

Generally, the presence of the car is considerable in different moments of the film and provides different situations which makes the story flow. The film begins for instance, with the scene where Chuckie picks up Will by his car in the morning, an action which repeats three times more later (once Chuckie picks Will up at the court’s entrance) and gives a hint for a close friendship between these two guys. The role of the car is highlighted at the very end as well during the long shot where Will drives down the road. In fact, the interior space of the car, structures the friendship between four guys–Will, Chuckie, Morgan and Billy–and shapes their character smoothly through different situations. While each of the situations has its own feature, it is valid for all to consider the car as the heterotopic space.

Situation One
Structure of The Friendship
[Invisible Hierarchy]

According to the on-going conversation between Chuckie, Will, Morgan and Billy in Chuckie’s car, it is possible to trace the role of each member in the group, structure the friendship and find out who is in the core.

Morgan is, almost always, under the power of Chuckie
Since in every fight between Chuckie and Morgan, Morgan is unable to do anything except nagging or accepting the situation.

Chuckie is one of the cores
Obviously, the mature character of Chuckie can be understood through the lines (specially when he talks with Morgan who has the Rebellious mode in his Child ego state) but apart from psychological terms, features of the interior space of the car also helps to enrich the characters. In this sense, the hypothesis can be that there is already a hierarchical system inside the car when the driver gains some advantages according to the organizations of the space and seats. If we look at the behavior of the occupants in a car, the driver is the only person who:

+ Controls the vehicle and is responsible for any problem during the ride,
+ Has the highest level of consciousness,
+ Has the best visual control over the surroundings

All mentioned above, gives some advantages to the driver and highlights the importance of his/her role in compare with other occupants. For Chuckie for instance, being the driver, is one of the elements of power, as the one who controls the steering wheel, who is the final decision-maker for the destinations and picks everyone up every day.

Will is another core
Based on the same hypothesis about the invisible hierarchical system inside the car, the second important occupant in the car is the one who seats next to the driver on the front seat. One reason is the wider visual contact with the surroundings in compare with those sitting on back seats, which can be taken as an advantage. It is also true that this front seat is the closest location to the driver seat (as the source of power) inside the car. Regarding this explanation, Will can be considered as another important character in the structure of this friendship. There is, however, another psychological reason lying under the lines which balances out the importance of Will and Chuckie’s character and it happens when:

Will's P.O.V. reveals Carmine Scarpaglia and his friends walking down the street. One of them casually lobs a bottle into a wire garbage can. It SHATTERS and some of the glass hits a FEMALE PASSERBY who, although unhurt, is upset.

WILL Hey hold up Chuck!
CHUCKIE What do we got?
WILL I don't know yet.

In fact, the way Chuckie follows his close friend’s demand for speeding down reveals the matter of reliability in their relationship. Moreover, if we take the aforementioned hypothesis about the invisible hierarchical system inside the car and the importance of the driver, now Will is controlling the car (by only asking the driver) without even touching the steering wheel which–at least–puts him in the same level of power as the driver.

Billy has the least important role
Through the lines, it is readable that Billy is not even aware of the fact that Morgan had a crush on the girl in the restaurant when he asks:

BILLY You gotta be kiddin’ me. Why do we even go to her?
CHUCKIE ’Cause fuckin’ Morgan’s got a crush on her, we always go there, and when we get to the window he never says a fuckin’ word to her, he never even gets out of the car, and she never gets our order right cause she’s the goddamn MISSING LINK!

BILLY You gotta be kiddin’ me. Why do we even go to her?
CHUCKIE ’Cause fuckin’ Morgan’s got a crush on her, we always go there, and
when we get to the window he never says a fuckin’ word to her, he
never even gets out of the car, and she never gets our order right
cause she’s the goddamn MISSING LINK!

And if we look at the position of Billy and his seat in the space, we understand that not only he locates in a place in the car with the longest distance with the driver as the source of power but also he has the minimum chance of having eye-contact with Chuckie as the driver and Will who sits on the front seat. In other words, Billy is already detached from the front part of the car and the only direct connection available is with Morgan which he doesn’t care about.

Situation Two
Structure of The Friendship
[Sympathy | Intimacy]

The small scale of the interior provides an intimate space for the boys and its combination with a song which is playing through the speakers for all gives them a communal experience while at the same time, car, as a moving object, provides continuous frames of the city through the window and detaches them from the outside world. The cinematic effect in fact, lets them wander out when they are lost in their own thoughts; a simultaneous being with others and being alone which uniquely occurs inside the car and highlights the heterotopic characteristic of the space.

Situation Three
Structure of The Friendship
[The Change]

Giving Will a new car as his birthday gift, is the beginning of the change in the friendship structure. The hypothesis about the hierarchical system of power/importance is valid here as well which refers to the independency as a sort of power. Will, by driving his own car, gains independency and reaches the position of deciding his own destination. On the other hand, before Chuckie, Morgan and Billy found out Will left, they followed the fixed structure of siting on their own seats and leaving the front seat for Will [although Chuckie always picks him as the last one, they all know that front seat is for Will]. The importance of front-seat’s position in the interior space of the car is more understandable when Morgan realizes Will is gone and enthusiastically changes his seat and run to the front seat to fill the gap of Will’s absence and somehow promote his power/importance level in the structure of the friendship.