Movie review by Greg Carlson
Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize Winner “A Thousand and One” is a vital New York story that unfolds over the course of a decade. And even though its spot-on period detail situates the drama in the place Toni Morrison called “the last true city,” the emotional weight of a mother’s love for a child is universal. The movie’s history-by-suggestion covers the mayoral tenure of Rudy Giuliani and stretches to include an audio excerpt of Michael Bloomberg’s January 1, 2002 inauguration address – the very line that references Morrison’s claim. Writer-director A. V. Rockwell’s first feature marks an auspicious debut. “A Thousand and One” is powerful and personal filmmaking.
Throughout the movie, Rockwell incisively critiques a number of structural systems that disadvantage those fighting for survival on the economic margins. But the struggle of the principal characters is never buried by the social commentary; the world inhabited by Teyana Taylor’s Inez is precise and charged with genuine urgency. Taylor is already well-known in the entertainment industry for her work as a busy recording artist, choreographer, writer, and actor. Her performance here as a woman who refuses to be chewed up, refuses to give up or give in, feels like a turning point or a breakthrough.
In just a few well-chosen compositions, Rockwell introduces Inez with pinpoint economy. Finishing a short sentence at Rikers Island (Rockwell confidently skips right past the traditional and expected release sequence), Inez quickly locates six-year-old Terry (Aaron Kingsley Adetola). This little boy, who we learn was placed in foster care while Inez was incarcerated, is too young to fully understand everything that is going on. But his presence motivates and energizes Inez, who, in essence, kidnaps him and disappears into Harlem. It is instantly clear that she will do whatever it takes to provide the kid with access to the tools for a better life.
Rockwell and Taylor combine forces in a way that steadily builds dramatic tension. Inez’s decisive act taking Terry away from legally-appointed guardianship carries with it a looming sense of dread at their possible discovery. As long as he is a minor, the family’s day-to-day requires vigilance, subterfuge and obfuscation to hide Terry’s identity from anyone who might find out what happened. But along with this centralized pressure, Rockwell illustrates the oppressive features of sweeping changes that brutalized – even criminalized – the poor under the guise of making things better and more livable for all.
From controversial and humiliating “stop and frisk” policing to the unconscionable tactics of cruel landlords who would profit from gentrification opportunities, “A Thousand and One” can suggest a David and Goliath battleground that threatens hopelessness. But Inez refuses to blink, even when a shocking revelation changes everything. Near the end of the movie, Inez says to the now 17-year-old Terry (Josiah Cross), “Nobody else give a shit about Black women except for other Black women, and even that shit get messy.” It’s yet another of Rockwell’s piercing observations, all the more potent for the way it alludes to the extraordinary sacrifices known only to a mother.