I recently watched good will hunting. During the whole movie i was wondering whats the accent used by Ben, Casey and Matt in the movie? It sounded so Australian. I thought these guys were born there but when I googled they weren’t. Looked up Boston accent too, didn’t find it close to what they spoke. It was more like a soft Aussie accent.

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  5. Bostonian, one of the classic American accents. Matt Demon was raised near Boston so it’s probably closer to his real voice than what you normally hear.

  7. So they’re attempting to replicate a Boston accent. Specifically a Southie (South Boston) accent.

    >Looked up Boston accent too, didn’t find it close to what they spoke.

    That’s cause most of them aren’t doing a very *strong* Boston accent.

    Edit: look, I get it, the actors are from Boston area. But I’ve heard them talk in interviews. They don’t have much of a natural Boston accent. They don’t talk like that in real life. The accent they use in the movie isn’t their natural accent. I used to work in Boston. My in laws are all from Southie with strong accents. At least in my opinion their accents in that movie sound a bit muted like they were trying for a Boston accent but only went halfway.

    Edit 2: ok, replaced “good” with “strong” to more precisely convey my point. Not making a value judgement here. But the reason the OP didn’t find it similar to a “Boston accent” you might find when Googling is because the accent they use in the movie is not especially strong. It’s a more muted version of a Boston accent

  8. I live near Boston and their accent is spot on Boston accent. Which is not surprising since they’re all from there.

  11. I wonder if OP is reminded of Australian accents because of the way they’re pronouncing the R at the end of words? I’m no expert on either accent, but I could see where someone might make that connection.

  12. They were all raised in the Boston area. The movie is set in Boston. They’re using their native accents, not putting on an accent for the movie. That’s how those guys talk. When you see them in other films or in interviews, they’re putting on an accent but you can hear their inflections come out on certain words.

  13. It’s definitely a working-class Boston accent (as opposed to an upper-class Boston ‘Brahmin’ accent, like JFK had).

    The accents are famous for being non-rhotic, so they drop their ‘R’s at the end of words – like British and Aussies do. Listen to this guy say [‘Park’s Department’](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbK4cL3QSc0&t=1s). ‘Pahks Depahtment’. The guy is from Medford, which is a nearby suburb.

    Though, the ‘R’s sometimes find their way into other words like “idea” becomes “idear”.

    Some people say the GWH accent is “South Boston” specifically, which fair enough, but I still call bullshit. South Boston was, at one time, very poor and insulated – so that was the only accent you’d hear there. But it’s super rare someone will know exactly what neighborhood you grew up in based on which flavor of Boston accent you have. Just class.

    Source: I live in Boston. The movie takes place here.

    Though, you have to understand that the famous ‘Boston accent’ is a becoming a thing of the past.

    Good Will Hunting was 25 years ago. The characters were 20 years old – which would make them 45 today.

    And pretty much everyone today under ~40 doesn’t have the accent. But everyone knows someone that has it. I’m in my mid-30s, I’ve probably met less than 10 people my age and under with a full accent.

    The city is quite international these days and full of transplants. South Boston is riddled with luxury high-rises – and the cost of living is prohibitively expensive for the ‘Will Hunting’s of the past.

    People will still incorporate some words and phrases synonymous with the Boston dialect (wicked, packie, dunks/dunkies). My wife still mispronounces words like “room” and “milk” as “rum” and “malk”. So there are remnants.

    If you want to hear that kind of accent *more* alive, you gotta go to to the outer ‘burbs. At least to Saugus or Brockton or something.

  17. Very much a Boston accent (living here myself I hear it all the time, I’ve even been accused of having this accent myself). With a few exceptions, people faking or even demonstrating the accent over emphasize the non-rhotic aspect and put in a strong ah sound when most of us just drop the r sound but the vowel sounds before it sounds ‘typical’. We don’t suddenly add emphasis to the last syllable, it stays at the beginning of the word as is typical in English. I’m not explaining that well but I hope it makes sense.

    Both Affleck and Damon are from the Boston area and might be able to just speak in a way that is normal to them rather than someone like Tom Hanks in Catch Me If You Can or Leo DiCaprio in The Departed.

  18. South Boston, which is also where those actors are from. So they have those accents, or know how to lean into it more

  19. boston accent. It sounds australian to you because it’s non-rhotic. pahk the cah ahn hahvahd yahd and all that

  20. Interesting that you’ve mentioned an Aussie accent. I have some family friends who are Australian and when I hear some southern accents I feel like they aren’t really that different. But I definitely get thinking south Boston accent would sound similar.

  22. As the movie very clearly states, it’s a Boston accent, specifically a Southie accent.

  27. My youngest kid had a slight speech impediment…pronounced R’s like W’s. I was military, so at our first parent teacher conference at the school she just transferred to the teacher asked how long we were stationed in the Boston area.

  28. People mock Bostonians for their accents but love the English one. But the Boston accent is the closest American one to the English one. Always confused me

  29. Damon and Affleck both lived in Massachusetts, and that is absolutely a south Boston accent. They play it up for the cameras to make absolutely sure we know they are Bostonians. Affleck and Damon practically grew up together, they met each other as small boys and went to the same schools. If I remember from an interview, they were trying to get roles when this one came along that was life changing.

    So yes, it is a Bostonian accent, and it is genuine. When they speak broadcast English they are disguising their roots.

  33. It *is* the Boston accent.

    Ben and Casey are better at it than Matt. They are all from Massachusetts so they would have been around it and picked up part of it (you can even hear it in some of Ben’s early performances like *Mallrats*)*.*

    I simply disagree that it sounds Australian but it isn’t as thick as many Bostonians or it would be seriously hard to understand.

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