Actor-writer-director Aziz Ansari - who won a Golden Globe for Best Actor for the Master of None series in 2018 - co-stars in Good Fortune with Keanu Reeves and Seth Rogen in a superb, laugh-out-loud comedy, with Reeves playing an angel who has come to earth, with a core of empathy for workers at the bottom of the gig economy
Representational pic/iStock
One of the more delightful mainstream films at the 50th Toronto International Film Festival, TIFF, was Good Fortune, an American film in English, in a Gala presentation. The film is directed by American comedian Aziz Ansari, with roots in Tamil Nadu. The film that also stars Keke Palmer and Sandra Oh is due for a worldwide theatrical release, including in India, on October 17, 2025.
From the South Asian Diaspora @TIFF, two diverse features comment on the evils of capitalism: Aneil Karia’s Hamlet in Centrepiece, starring Riz Ahmed and Sheeba Chaddha, a powerful British film adapting Shakespeare’s great tragedy in Punjabi and Shakespearean English. And with Good Fortune, it takes forward the trend of comedians becoming film actors/stars/directors, including Charlie Chaplin, Chris Rock and Jordan Peele, to our own Kapil Sharma, as singers once became film stars when sound came to the movies.
The film follows an angel named Gabriel (Reeves) who is a lowly angel with small wings not assigned more taxing duties than stopping people from texting and driving at the same time. But when he sees the struggles of gig worker Arj (Aziz Ansari), a delivery man working for an app-based company, who works multiple shifts, yet can barely feed himself and sleeps in his car, that gets towed away because of unpaid parking tickets. He swaps his life with that of a wealthy venture capitalist Jeff (Seth Rogen) at whose California mansion he delivers some goods. Gabriel assumes Arj will soon see how flaky the good, wealthy life is and want to swap back with his own modest life, but is in a dilemma as Arj is having too much fun with cocktails in the pool, and has no intention of swapping back to his own humble life.
While the film’s narrative borrows some elements from Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire (1987), in which an angel comes to earth; and Freaky Friday (body swap), with nods to Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life, where a man considers suicide, and changes his mind when he is reminded of his selfless deeds to others, and how much remains to be done. In Good Fortune, there is some back and forth in the narrative (Gabriel is visible only to Arj), with some delightful laugh-out comedy, but we learn of the hearts of gold at the bottom of the gig economy: Arj’s on-off partner with a heart of gold, who wants to start a new union to fight for all their rights, not just those who happen to have it good for now.
Keanu Reeves, playing a deadpan angel, is the heart of the film. Seth Rogen is deadpan and has a dry wit as well.
Ansari had earlier directed 11 episodes of the critically acclaimed Netflix series Master of None, which he co-created, as well as his 2022 comedy special Nightclub Comedian.
Lionsgate presents Good Fortune, which is backed by Aziz Ansari, Anthony Katagas, and Alan Yang. Aniz Adam Ansari, Jonathan McCoy, Christopher Woodrow, and Connor DiGregorio serve as executive producers. PVR INOX Pictures is bringing the film to Indian theatres.
Meenakshi Shedde, film curator, has been working with the Toronto, Berlin and other festivals worldwide for 30 years. She has been a Cannes Film Festival Jury Member and Golden Globes International Voter, and is a journalist and critic. Reach her at meenakshi.shedde @mid-day.com
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