In her feature debut A Thousand and One, writer-director A.V. Rockwell turns her lens on Inez (Teyana Taylor), a young woman recently released from prison who is determined to reconnect with her 6-year-old son Terry (Aaron Kingsley Adetola). A product of the foster care system, Inez desperately wants more for her child, but in a city that moves at a dizzying pace, she has no one to rely on but herself. In a moment of recklessness, she kidnaps Terry from his group home, leaving the streets of Brooklyn for Harlem just as a newly elected Rudy Giuliani steps into the city’s highest office. As much as A Thousand and One is about a mother and a son, it’s also about a version of New York City that no longer exists and the citizens who got lost in the shuffle.
The film debuted at Sundance in January to rave reviews, going on to win the grand jury prize at the festival and earn a Certified Fresh 98% Tomatometer score from critics. Ahead of its release in theaters on March 31, we spoke with Rockwell about how she recreated 1990s New York City and why she chose to tackle subjects like gentrification, colorism, and the foster care system.
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