This American comedy tells the story of an angel, called Gabriel, who decides to teach a struggling man a lesson that money doesn’t necessarily solve human problems.
GOOD FORTUNE. Starring: Seth Rogen, Aziz Ansari, Keke Palmer, Sandra Oh, and Keanu Reeves. Directed by Aziz Ansari. Rated M (Crude humour, coarse language, drug use, and sexual references). 97 min.
Review by Peter W Sheehan, Jesuit Media Australia
An angel called Gabriel (Keanu Reeves) wants to show a struggling man called Arj (Aziz Ansari) that money isn’t the way to reliably solve his problems. Gabriel body-swaps Arj with Jeff (Seth Rogen), who is a wealthy employer. Gabriel is a rather special guardian angel, however, and he loses his angel’s wings which limits his work as an angel, with Gabriel becoming a low-ranking Angel in the heavens above. Principal photography for the film takes place in Los Angeles, USA, and we first meet Arj sleeping homeless in his car and showering at the YMCA.
Gabriel fails initially in his attempt to convince Arj that wealth on Earth doesn’t really matter. Arj is down on his luck and does odd jobs for Jeff. To better convince Arj, Gabriel decides to to go down to Earth and live the life of a human. On Earth, he takes over Jeff’s body and livelihood, and for a time he becomes Jeff. The real Jeff, however, is used to leading a life of excess, and Gabriel’s interventions substantially change Arj’s “fortune”. It is decreed from above that Gabriel is failing in his attempt to save Arj’s soul, and Gabriel loses his Angel wings to Martha (Sandra Oh), another Angel. Elena (Keke Palmer) works with Arj, but does so for better working conditions so as to unionise the world around her. With his wings gone, Gabriel wants to get them back, and realises that he needs them to help save “lost souls” like Arj.
This is a comic movie with social bite, and multiple sub-plots revolve around its chief concerns. Seth Rogen is an established comedian, and the film supports a team of comedians who aim for good cheer throughout. The film deals thoughtfully with homelessness, and the fake allure of affluent economies, and help from above is conceptualised in human ways. Although, Angels in the film are well meaning, they are also depicted to illustrate “human ineptness”.
This is an angel-themed comedy that stands apart from the strict formulation of the tenets of any religious belief systems, and social mayhem is created by the film’s Director and actors intentionally. The film attacks stereotypical views of what “good fortune” means, and it attempts to contextualise religious belief systems in comic fashion. At no stage does the film endorse a lack of human empathy or criticise human compassion. The film entertainingly captures the social complexities of life’s contemporary struggles, and it uses physical comedy to reinforce some interesting messages about the social pitfalls that can characterise so-called “gig economies”.
Reviewed by Peter Sheehan, an Associate of Jesuit Media