Best Keanu: “How will I know when I’m done chewing?”

I don’t know when exactly my fun job turned into my not-so-fun job, but it was some time before I started looking into the possibility of forming a union. That started seriously this past summer, and continues as we speak (or I write).

We are paired with an organizer now, from an established union. He’s fantastic, so the issue right now is not him, it’s the “we” part. It’s the hard work of getting a few, really committed people on board to start having those on-the-ground conversations. So when we start asking people to sign union cards (or online forms, the modern version), enough say yes.

Right now, it’s me and one other guy, and he told me yesterday that if his planned chats with a few specific other people fail, “at least we tried.” But we didn’t, really. We didn’t really try. He might be ready to call it quits, but I want to keep going, because I know it’s the only chance we have to really bring about change.

My workplace has one owner, a wealthy woman in her 80s. The company has about 200 employees, mainly service workers in one capacity or another (myself included). People stay at this job longer than they originally intend, largely because it’s something, it’s a bit of money, and helps to weather the ups and downs of one’s economic life (we all have one, an “economic life,” if you can call it that).

But it’s also rampant with favoritism, exploitation, bullying, and—what does Keke Palmer’s character say in Good Fortune? Added responsibilities and lack of training. Very low pay. Yeah, I sure hear that. Meanwhile, our aging owner, who still comes by to visit us frequently, lives in a multi-million dollar home and continues to buy up expensive properties in the neighbourhood. She’s not hurting for money, clearly, and neither is her business—as she reminded us via video presentation in an all-hands team meeting a few years ago, “PROFIT” is one (the) major objective of her operation.

If you’ve seen Good Fortune, you understand why I started with that story (or background, since I’ll admit it’s not much of a story). You’ll also probably get why Good Fortune had me the minute Elena (Keke) sat down with Arj (Aziz Ansari) and said, “you know things could be better, right? That’s why I’m trying to start a union.” But the union subplot is just one reason I liked Good Fortune, and why I landed on a 5/5 star rating (a rating that, I’ll admit moved in my head from 3.5 up to 5 over the course of the film).

The perfect score ultimately comes from one very specific scene with Keanu Reeves. But I think I’ll get to that at the end of this post.

Let’s start with the fact that Good Fortune is not a comedy. You’re tricked into thinking it will be, because it’s Ansari and Seth Rogen. There’s a lovely cameo by Sherry Cola, who you should know from a very, very funny movie called Joyride. If you don’t, and you’re in the mood for (somewhat blue) comedy, check out that (Seth Rogen-produced) movie.

There are some chuckle-inducing encounters in the early scenes. But ultimately, this isn’t a funny film. For a while, you even fear it’s going to border on depressing, especially if it hits too close to home.

Arj is sleeping in his car, doing gig jobs to eat. Pretty much literally. He meets Elena when they’re both employed at a big-box hardware store. She’s a furniture designer and builder, and says she took the job for the discounts on lumber. They have a date, and are about to have another one after Arj has become the on-probation assistant to Jeff (Rogen), a tech bro who spends much of his time, well, killing it. Killing time. Jeff spends his hours killing time, while Arj (now in his employ) is temporarily upgraded from sleeping in his car to lodging at a cheap motel.

Arj catches the eye of Gabriel (Keanu Reeves), a lower-order angel who’s actually been assigned to help Elena. His job is to stop her from texting and driving, so she avoids an accident. This is Gabriel’s usual role: he stops people from texting, so they look up in time to stop a disaster. But this important job isn’t satisfying for Gabriel, who looks with envy at Azrael (Stephen McKinley Henderson), whose responsibility is saving lost souls. The eventual upshot: Gabriel ineffectively interferes with Arj in an attempt to help him see the value in his life. Gabriel’s gaffe leaves Arj and Jeff with swapped lives, each aware of what’s occured, and Gabriel without his wings, living a human life. Until it can all be sorted out.

The relatively surprising plot got points with me, as it was more complicated and deeper than you might expect. I also thought it was well written, in the sense that if you read the script you would think this is a great script. Even if it didn’t always translate well on screen, the meat of something strong is really there.

The cast is also fantastic, because it’s made up entirely of people you enjoy watching. Not just “people you can tolerate”—it’s actors who really elevate the piece, whatever it is, because you’re happy just seeing them on screen. For me, it’s Keanu, Rogen, Ansari, Henderson (if you don’t know his name, you certainly know his face), Sandra Oh, Cola, Keke… they’re all wonderful to watch, and that alone is worth the price of admission.

Good Fortune gets a star or two alone for its deft handling of its central question—how can we justify, or find meaning and value in, our lives of disadvantage. Elena’s role here is essential. She refuses the offer from Arj (living Jeff’s wealthy life) of a quickie trip to Paris, because it conflicts with an organizing meeting, and it had been “so hard to get everyone together.” Elena finds meaning and purpose in things that are difficult, and even keeps going in the aftermath of (apparent) failure.

It is a tough balance for a storyteller to show that meaning and purpose arising in an environment of disadvantage do not justify that disadvantage. The message is more holding onto that belief that you are in a certain place, at a certain time, for a higher reason. You don’t have to stay there, and it doesn’t excuse those who wronged you or who perpetuated a system that allowed it to happen. But there is always a space, however tiny, to find purpose. Even if takes all you have to seek it out.

There’s also a note about responsibility when one has advantage, in whatever context, to change things, so the burden does not rest on those whose hardship has fed your abundance.

The five star rating comes from the diner scene between Keanu and Rogen, just after Gabriel has become human. It’s perhaps midway through the film, but it’s the final element that, for me, made up for Good Fortune‘s imperfections.

Gabriel and Jeff are eating hamburgers. And Keanu looks old.

He looks beautifully aged, like the 60-year-old (or so) he is (was, when the scene was filmed). For most of Keanu’s career, he’d always looked much younger on screen than he actually was. There’s a temptation, I would think, for those around Keanu to want to try to preserve that youthful look even when it strains credibility. And it is now straining credibility. Because he’s a man in his 60s now, and he has gray hair in his beard, and let’s be honest, on his head too. Seeing it authentically shown on screen in that one scene was truly beautiful to me. Because there’s still peace and contentment, soulfulness, in those eyes, and wrinkles show wisdom, a life deeply lived.

The beauty of age is also on display in the few scenes where Gabriel is working as a dishwasher, his long hair tied back, his wiry frame looking frail. He looks like a burnout, precisely what the character is experiencing. Because ultimately it’s all about being where you are, at a certain point in time, for a higher reason. It’s embracing change, what currently is, and deciding how to eek out purpose and meaning.

October 2025