{"id":121731,"date":"2025-10-14T16:13:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T16:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/121731\/"},"modified":"2025-10-14T16:13:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T16:13:09","slug":"film-review-good-fortune-is-a-decent-directorial-debut-from-aziz-ansari","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/121731\/","title":{"rendered":"Film Review: \u2018Good Fortune\u2019 is a Decent Directorial Debut from Aziz Ansari"},"content":{"rendered":"

Director:<\/strong> Aziz Ansari
Writer: Aziz Ansari<\/strong>
Stars: Aziz Ansari, Seth Rogen, Keanu Reeves<\/strong><\/p>\n

Synopsis:<\/strong> A well-meaning but rather inept angel named Gabriel meddles in the lives of a struggling gig worker and a wealthy venture capitalist.<\/p>\n

After many years of trying to get a feature directorial debut on our screens, Aziz Ansari\u2019s Good Fortune arrives on our screens. People who follow movie news may recall that this was not Ansari\u2019s first attempt at directing a movie. In 2022, production on Being Mortal, which was set to be his debut, was suspended after Searchlight Pictures received a complaint against actor Bill Murray, who made inappropriate gestures towards a crew member during filming. The studio ultimately decided not to resume filming, which led Ansari to move forward with Good Fortune. He retained actors Keke Palmer and Seth Rogen from his first attempt for this second go-around, which recently premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival to fairly strong reviews.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Having now seen the movie, I can confirm that Good Fortune is indeed a decent time, though one wonders exactly what the future holds for Ansari in filmmaking. The movie doesn\u2019t try to reinvent the wheel, nor subvert audience expectations. It delivers precisely what its trailer promises: a classic body-swap story focusing on Arj, a struggling gig worker (played by Ansari) switching places with Jeff (Seth Rogen), a rich venture capitalist who lives the good life. Arj previously worked for Jeff as his assistant. However, after making a shortsighted decision that, although not catastrophic, led to his dismissal, he aspires to achieve the same level of success Jeff has.<\/p>\n

Arj has been struggling to make ends meet, to the point of sleeping in his car to avoid paying for rent or even a motel room. It\u2019s at the lowest point in his life where he meets a guardian angel named Gabriel (Keanu Reeves), who tells him there\u2019s so much more he can look forward to in his life if he keeps going, showing him a vision of a future Arj working a minimum wage mail delivery job that forces him to pee in a bottle, moving into the house of his partner, Elena (Keke Palmer), which includes several relatives clashing over the most frivolous things, and euthanize the future dog he\u2019ll eventually buy. Yeah, that sounds like some life!<\/p>\n

No wonder he wants what Jeff has, which Gabriel believes is nothing more than materialistic elements that won\u2019t bring him the joy and fulfillment he wants out of life. That\u2019s why the angel thinks that switching places with Jeff will make him realize what matters most. Yet, most of Arj\u2019s problems are solved through becoming the ultra-rich venture capitalist who lives a life of excess, enjoys driving his Tesla around the streets of Los Angeles, and throws parties at his expense, without worrying whether he\u2019ll have money to get by for the next month.<\/p>\n

Jeff, on the other hand, is living Arj\u2019s day-to-day struggles of gaining money, while Gabriel, going against his duty as an angel, has his wings taken by Martha (Sandra Oh) and becomes human. Throughout this story, the three will learn fundamental experiences they will, of course, carry with them for the rest of their lives, which is the ultimate lesson the movie wants to bring out to the audience. However, Ansari gets to this emotional conclusion rather haphazardly. Instead of making this \u201cheart\u201d the beating soul of Good Fortune, it seems to take a backseat in favor of mostly entertaining, yet oddly lukewarm comedic scenes that, out of context, are funny, but don\u2019t necessarily bring about much enjoyment in the grand scheme of the movie.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some of the jokes get repetitive relatively fast, and it\u2019s also a problem when the movie itself is built on the cyclical situations that a body (or, in this case, life) swap picture brings. How many times do we see the contrast between Arj living the good life and Jeff getting a taste of what \u201cthe grind\u201d truly is? Ansari also tries to insert a pro-union commentary in Elena\u2019s storyline that is obviously welcomed, but feels like such an afterthought that it barely has any impact on the emotional progression of the characters, if only to highlight how much of an asshole Arj has become after having all the money in the world.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s an obviously telegraphed beat that could\u2019ve been played better, but Ansari effectively compensates with one of the best \u201clate-stage\u201d turns I\u2019ve seen in a long time from Keanu Reeves. I\u2019ll admit not being the biggest fan of his comedic work, compared to his action movie roles in Point Break, Speed, The Matrix, and John Wick, but when Gabriel becomes human, his turn is so sincere that it feels hard to dismiss it entirely. The human experience of tasting a good ol\u2019 American burger, chicken nuggets, chocolate milkshakes or even smoking cigarettes feels like an epiphany for an angel whose sole purpose seems completely futile in the grand scheme of his order, and Reeves completely sinks into the role that we ultimately wish he were our guardian angel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to portray a divine figure and illustrate its most human aspects, yet, in becoming human and learning to appreciate the value of life, Gabriel begins to understand why Arj wants what Jeff has, and why Jeff wants his world back. Reeves is profoundly moving as an angel who learns what he should strive to do when he eventually gets his wings back, despite the schmaltzy nature of segments like these. It does bring about a few poignant sections with the three, especially Rogen, who has fun bathing in the absurdity of an age-old situation we\u2019ve seen countless times before. Ansari, on the other hand, doesn\u2019t have the same sense of wit and comedic timing that made him such a household name in stand-up and on his Netflix show Master of None, despite giving a pretty solid turn as Arj.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As a director, he handles himself well, though one hoped his film would be more visually polished than looking like an unaired TV pilot. Ansari is lucky to have a great cast surrounding him \u2013 he doesn\u2019t need to do much to elevate their performances. Keke Palmer is a compelling screen presence on her own! The same can be said for both Reeves and Rogen, who have consistently demonstrated why audiences gravitate towards their work.
Even with an aggressively paint-by-numbers screenplay, Ansari knows he\u2019ll be getting something entertaining with such a well-mounted cast, and he mostly succeeds. Regardless of Good Fortune\u2019s glaring shortcomings, it won\u2019t be hard for you to leave the cinema with a smile on your face, and hope instilled in wanting to make the most out of your life before it\u2019s too late. After all, if we don\u2019t step into an uncomfortable zone and make decisions that could alter our lives forever, how will we know if it gets any better?<\/p>\n

Grade: B<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Director: Aziz AnsariWriter: Aziz AnsariStars: Aziz Ansari, Seth Rogen, Keanu Reeves Synopsis: A well-meaning but rather inept angel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":121732,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[263],"tags":[18,117,1176,74173,19,17,74174,74175,327],"class_list":{"0":"post-121731","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-featured","11":"tag-featured-posts","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-latest-releases","15":"tag-movie-reviews","16":"tag-movies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}