Before I had a chance to see A Thousand and One, the new film set in 1990s Harlem, I showed it to an audience of 30 people, many of them murmuring to each other as they left, asking what their companions thought would happen next.
In my 25 years as a projectionist, I’ve found that many viewers have little patience for inconclusive endings, and I can still hear the woman demanding that I tell her if actor Mads Mikkelsen and the injured woman in the sled survived long enough to be rescued by the helicopter that lands at the end of 2018’s Arctic. Does she think that projectionists see sequels withheld from the audience?
A Thousand and One is different, at least for those who left the cinema more appreciative of what Inez, played by singer and actor Teyana Taylor, had accomplished rather than skeptical of how she did it. In the latter category was one woman who left complaining, “Another depressing movie!” Those in the former category appeared glad to have the option of speculating what Inez might do next, including two women who were aglow, one saying, “Whoa, that was exhausting, but it was sooooo worth it!”
Expressions on most faces, and the “thanks” offered to me as they passed, suggested that theirs was the consensus view. That night it became my view as well when I was able to watch from start to finish.
Exhausting? Well, it’s certainly not light entertainment. It’s emotionally charged, and the setting is as crowded as it is chaotic. It begins with Inez’s release from Riker’s Island, and moves immediately into her attempts to reclaim her boy from foster care and establish a new life for them.
Obstacles abound. Their backstory is mysterious (and offers a plot twist when least expected), but the present is so fraught with obstacles and strained relationships, that we keep looking to their next steps. Arguments erupt; payphones take such a beating they may be lucky they no longer exist; reconciliation is not so much sought as necessitated. As Inez at one point exhales:
Damaged people do not know how to love.
While director A.V. Rockwell keeps the focus on Inez and Terry–played by three actors aged 6, 13, and 17, which makes for a relevant comparison to 2016’s Moonlight–the frame of 1990s New York City is a tight fit. Midway in the film, we see Mayor Giuliani’s “Stop & Frisk” policy in action as police push Terry and his friends up against graffitied walls. Before the credits roll, a new landlord buys in to “urban renewal,” which African-American leaders called–and still call–a euphemism for “Negro removal.”
The neighborhood is all apartment buildings several stories high with no space between them, targeted for demolition. Inez and Terry make a home in apt. 10-01, which vies with “one thousand and one obstacles” as the title’s reference. Not only does she afford it, she keeps him in school where he proves to high school teachers and a guidance councillor that he is Ivy League material.
She marries an old boyfriend; he woos a cashier at a fast food place. There’s also a small support group that completes a neighborhood cast that shows us what industrious, conscientious people can accomplish in the most pressing environment, defying all stereotypes without bothering to say the term “systemic racism.”
A Thousand and One is realism at its finest. The language is often rough and the street scenes are always gritty, but Ida B. Wells, Steven Crane, Richard Wright and others comitted to telling the truth of American urban life would agree with the two women who saw it before I did:
“Soooooo worth it!”
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Mouth of the River 