Aziz Ansari’s directorial debut “Good Fortune” doesn’t deliver on the comedy its stacked cast would promise and never fully comes around to delivering a message on the issues it serves up.
Ansari also wrote the movie and stars alongside Seth Rogen, Keanu Reeves and Keke Palmer.
The film takes place in Los Angeles, almost immediately recognizable by the signs touting gasoline for $4.49 a gallon.
Ansari’s character, Arj, is failing to stay afloat in the gig economy while juggling delivery driving and Taskrabbit-esque jobs. He eventually falls in with Rogen’s Jeff, a wealthy “tech bro” turned venture capitalist, as his assistant.
All the while, Reeves’ character Gabriel, a low-rung guardian angel, watches as the two opposite men interact and eventually clash.
The film’s first act plods on until near the 30-minute mark when Gabriel intervenes against the instructions of his superior angels, played by Sandra Oh and Stephen McKinley Henderson.
Gabriel switches Arj and Jeff’s lives, giving them a taste of how each other lives.
This wrinkle sets off a patchwork of familiar tropes that come together for a fairly original plot that is a fun ride in the moment but ultimately falls on the side of forgettable.
Ansari’s performance barely sets itself apart from any other on-screen appearance by the “Master of None” creator and star. He walks the line between silly comedy and sincerity too rigidly and fails to step off when a scene calls him to go in either direction.
Rogen’s character is even more disappointing. He has been kingpin of comedy movies since the mid-2000s and has largely outlasted his compatriots of the era, proving he can adapt through the decades as seen in Apple TV’s hit “The Studio.”
However, the script struggles to make use of his prowess and. It doesn’t introduce a character audiences haven’t seen him play before. Jeff is ultimately a rehashing of his portrayal of real-life investor Gabe Plotkin in “Dumb Money.” Rogen gives viewers the exact same flavor of out-of-touch millionaire.
Reeves is lumped into the same bucket as Rogen, angel wings and all. The “John Wick” star has been playing a caricature of himself on screen for nearly a decade, offering little else than a box office draw and a familiar face for fans.
“Good Fortune” is no different. Reeves’ discovery of what it means to be a human as an angel cast down to earth is played with the same monotone as Wick slaughtering a Russian mobster. When mixed with outdated internet humor — we are well past finding grown men calling them chicken “nuggies” cute or funny — it misses the mark.
The film’s biggest sin doesn’t come from any of the on-screen character’s actions; it comes from the movie’s inability to make Palmer’s character, Elena, anything more meaningful than another one of Arj’s material obsessions.
The actress proved she had comedy chops that rival the rest of “Good Fortune”’s cast in “One of Them Days” earlier this year, but she was given virtually zero chances to shine opposite Ansari: “love interest” is an overstatement of what Elena boils down to.
Ansari’s script has bright moments, often when least expected. A quick joke about gun statistics from Reeves during the resolution generated a bigger chuckle than any of the hand-holding jokes that Ansari set on a tee for Rogen or Reeves to take a hack at.
In a less-than-common case, this movie would have benefitted from a longer run time. Gabriel spent a third of the film’s 98-minute run time acting as a plot device to further Arj’s arc before ultimately becoming one of the more compelling facets of the story. This left him playing catch-up, and his separate ending was shoe-horned after the rest of the characters’, leaving little time to fully sit with either.
“Good Fortune” tried too hard to bounce between comedy and genuine sincerity on class disparity and human joy, and it never reached far enough in either direction.
I’ll borrow a line from a movie that “Good Fortune” no doubt took pieces from as well: If every time a viewer laughed, an angel gained its wings, then there would be plenty of fallen Gabriels still walking the human realm.
Adam Mueller can be reached at muel7541@stthomas.edu.
