The Peacock original Film A Thousand and One

 

 

This Article will be featured and referenced in the plot is my jam podcast.(available on any podcast platform)

we are reviewing The Peacock original Film A Thousand and One

First off I like to say heavy spoilers because I’m a tell you the movie verbatim. Awesome I’m going to include a little bit of my personal feelings about the movie and then give a rating at the end.

This peacock original movie stars the lovely and talented, songstress actor and entrepreneur and dancer Teyana Taylor. This movie originally came out in 2023 it is a drama/mystery movie and its film time is one hour and 56 minutes so baby you better be ready to sit down for a long minute get your popcorn and drinks on the deck or be able to pause the movie a few times and take some bathroom breaks.

The cast includes

Teyana Taylor as Inez

Josiah  Cross as Terry

William Callet as Lucky

Aaron Kingsley as Terry

Aven Courtney as Terry

Tara Pacheco as Alicia

Terri Avenue as Kim Jones

Lena Lando, as news anchor

Alicia, pilgrim as Simone

And many more fabulous actors

And actresses.

He was a bit of background about the movie

Release date: March 31, 2023 (USA)

Director: A.V. Rockwell

Box office: 3.4 million USD

Screenplay: A.V. Rockwell

Producers: Lena Waithe, Rishi Rajani, Julia Lebedev, Eddie Vaisman, Brad Weston

Production companies: Hillman Grad, Makeready, Sight Unseen Pictures

    So before we even talk about the movie itself, let’s talk about the ratings and some of the reviews

IMDb rated a 7.1* this is out of 10

Google gives it a 4.2* this is out of five

There is an 85% on Popcornflix out of 100

Rotten tomato rating at a 96%

But just because these are the ratings does not mean that these are going to read it as personally even though I love Teyana Taylor, and I know that she’s a dope actress, and from what I can tell this movie is  Dope so Addicted. so as I am writing this, as I am reviewing it at the same time. Also, will get into the video version of it. I’ll put the link in the article of my review. Now by the end of this article or if you watching the video the end of the video, I will let you know when my reading is either get one out of 1010 being dope so addicted you should go see this one being I’m clean I don’t think you should see this or I don’t wanna see it, I’m gonna be honest wouldn’t likely it’s going to be a high rating.

Based upon the view of the reviews, we get a snapshot, so it talks about the main character Inez, who kidnaps a six-year-old unapologetically because she feels like she’s doing the right thing and she wants to take back her six-year-old child from the foster care system. The objective of Inez and her family is to reclaim the sense of home and family togetherness that they once had. while living in the ever-growing crazy changing New York City.

OK now let’s get into what is actually going on the tea of it all.

So we begin the movie with Teyana Taylor’s character on his and her cellmate and present doing their normal day-to-day. So essentially, she has an appointment with one of the inmates where she is working on their makeup.

We flipped to the next scene where Inez, which is “Teyana Taylor” character is walking through the streets of New York

She went to go over, claim how old job like it was nothing she got missing and nobody knew where she was honey. And her old boss said I was wondering where you were or you got missing for a long time and she said OK well just let me get my old pay And he said Honey now what do you mean from a year and a half ago?

I saw that and thought that was funny. and he looked at her crazy and she said well then give me my job back and he said oops I’m just gonna give you the money here you go. so at this point, she lives there and she’s going through her normal day-to-day life and trying to catch up doing her hustle by doing hair and she’s living her life in a shelter letting all the people know what was going on in the past, and why she was missing. they said you know, Annette sees this little boy walking down the street as she is doing one of her friend's/customers' hair.

So she goes up to the little boy and she says Terry you don’t hear me calling you you don’t remember me, and a little boy is ignoring her hard body karate like he is ignoring her like she is invisible and mute at the same time.

So she tells her son, Terry, that she is back for good now and she’s going to be across the street at the shelter. Then she says to him I just wanna make sure you’re doing OK and she gives them some money so they can get another ice. Teri is not feeling it. He does not want to talk to his mom at all.

I don’t blame him honey because he feels neglected, rejected, and just like he doesn’t have his mom which is so desperately needed She also tells the kids to keep the fact that she came over then to see him between them because she’s not supposed to be over there. Honey, the tea is really an even 10 minutes in. so at this point, she is going out daily which is what it seems like to me and just watching him and keeping an on him because she misses him when I tell you she’s sitting out there on that. Barbee is looking at her son like he’s the last chicken leg on the plate or the last piece of salad in the bowl honey, she got the eagle down. She watched him like a hawk in the sky. I’m high like  Aaliyah says.

So at this point, and Nas is on her grind, she is trying to sell her services to get that money honey and I am here for it.

I want to say to you, Teyana Taylor was the right person for this character because she is a hustler and a grinder and she reminds me of everybody I know from up north that is a female. She reminds me of me like I love this story all Rady the grind is real. She’s sending out flyers. She’s talking to people in cars she’s waving people down. She is this into it, honey. She’s like she gonna let this money pass. I’m coming to you.

So, honey, it’s real. Her son fell out the window and hit his head and how she gets the information from one of his little friends as he had to ride parent Lee he fell out the window because of the fact that his foster mother did something to make him mad and so he fell out the window. That’s crazy.

So she goes to visit him in the hospital and she’s very upset about what’s going on and she told him how serious the situation could’ve been. And then they got into a discussion about the fact that.

So here’s the dilemma she finds out there’s a possibility that her son is going to be moved and of course, she is feeling very sad because her son says to her. Why do you keep leaving me ? Now the plot thickens. Inez cannot bear the idea of her being so close to her son and then losing him again so she asks him. Do you wanna come with me just for a few days she takes him to Harlem as she grew up.

This story is about Home so hard. It reminds me of my situation of myself and my son. Every time I look at the little boy's face I look at my phone and remember things that I went through the stories are so dope.

So I miss looking for a place to stay frantically. Finally, she listens to one-hour home girls and stays over there for the night. Next thing you know they get up in the morning there are some issues with the mother of her friends and the size she is going to leave All the while the city is looking for her son who is missing from Brooklyn. The reason why she got upset was that her friend's mother called her a bad mother, and she feels all this overwhelming guilt on the inside from being locked up and not having herself and her son in the right situation I honestly could identify with this character so very low being from up north, going to the things that I would do anything for him, and realizing I was not even ready my own self to help me how can I help myself in my son.

I think it’s dope that even when she leaves her friend's house, she’s able to muster up enough strength to find someone nice enough to let her stay with her and get her off the lawn with her beautician side hustle business so she can pay the bills.

So finally, she decides to take a regular job based upon her landlord's advice to get more money. And eventually, she’s able to move out into a place of her own with her and her son no this time she didn’t have a babysitter, so her son was by herself chilling and Playing with toys in the food that he had for leftovers, which was dope, but he didn’t get to go to school because of the fact that he technically was kidnapped. This goes on for some time and then one day he comes home from school and finds that his mom says that she has a new man staying with them, and at first it sees peaches and cream until he finally freaks out and says, where has the boy been? Where is he come from he was locked up at first, so he had no news about what was going on with this Boy and then he goes and leaves for a while and finally decides to come back and they stay together and they make the family work and they finally get married.

This movie is giving me a weird déjà vu.

I just want to add that in the scene where Teyana Taylor is coming in the house with her son and she’s staring at her boyfriend while he’s on the motorcycle looking at two women, I think to myself Tiara is wearing that black hair in that outfit. she is killing it but that’s just a side note.

Also, I want to add when they come into the house after this whole situation happens the conversation that goes down she says I saw you staring at her with my own eyes. He says you’re tripping basically and she says is it because she’s not her to me, or because her hair is nicer than mine. He said you’re too sensitive and then she says will just be sensitive to my sensitivity. I don’t know how many times as a black woman I’ve had this conversation and as a woman of darker skin color that I felt like this, especially when another woman comes around who is lighter or skinnier or richer or all of the above? It makes you feel inadequate or insufficient in some way. Especially if your man leaves you and is missing for a time. All the thoughts will be going through your head, so yeah but back to the story.

Sophie, FlashForward, and Terry, how’s gonna be the teenager now and his teachers think that he should take a test to find out if he should be in a more advanced school. He’s very reluctant about this test, but he takes it to come to find out if he gets into a good school, but there are some issues. Apparently, Inez and Loki are arguing and they didn’t tell Terry on top of that lucky thing that Terry would be found at any school. It doesn’t matter if he goes to an advanced school. So now they’re having issues with not only Terry’s schooling but also the fact that Lucky has been going missing for weeks without telling ideas where he is.

On top of that drama lately, Teri has been getting stopped by the cops even though he has another name his mother is very concerned, and she keeps saying repeatedly over and over in this one seeing something going to happen because he keeps getting stopped by the cops.

So next thing you know like he leaves he’s upset he needs some time to cool down. He does that periodically throughout the movie but this time Terry notices he’s upset, but he goes out to the local bodega decides to get something to eat from the store and I said you know he sees his pops Terry they play basketball they start talking about his decision to go to this new school possibly They have a tremendous one01 moment Ritory is hugged by lucky lucky tails Terry that he loves them. This is a beautiful moment cut to the next scene where Inez is coming out of the subway, and Terry is gone, but Lucky is standing by a payphone, flirting with Inez, saying hey, I can’t greet my lady and it’s like nothing ever happened.

Flash forward Lucky is in the hospital. As he lies in his hospital bed Terry is going through CDs trying to find out which one Lucky wants him to play.

So basically they’re living in a home that is one down in the parking lot and come out but it’s so bad the handlebar is coming off the stove and the tiles are coming out of the shower and there are so many different issues at the apartment every time the new maintenance man who just started and the new owner come in to fix one thing they had to fix 10 other things, so he tells Inez that he needs her to realize that she needs to get all these things fixed and they’re going to come back and fix so initially I miss things. OK, we’ll set up a day and you come in when one of us is here but he says no you guys are gonna have to leave it so she thinks it’s a few days but it’s actually going to be several months, which means that they’re going to be homeless and he says the only other option is if she completely moves it kind of sounds like gentrification. in fact that it seems like exactly what it is. This is crazy because literally, I live in low-income housing right now we’re about to move into the house in about a month but about to reuse go they renovate everything and update things and then some things happen with the rules in the rent. I feel like this is a part of my story it’s crazy.

So something I love is a cute love story that is going on apparently Terry has grown up and he had a crush on this girl ever since he was 15 years old that works at the local restaurant and now you finally get the daycare, honey. The cheapest of this whole relationship is real.

Due to the fact that they were going to say money issues, Terry was really distant in school with it able to make the quality wanted to make and his advisor noticed that he was going through some tough times at home and at school so she asked him what was going on with his father since he’s been in the hospital and Terry said they think that he’s not coming out and also our landlord seems like he’s trying to evict us. I’m basically the counselor offer him a job but he has to have his Social Security card and birth certificate, and we all know that’s a big issue because she got the birth certificate and Social Security card from someone that was under a different name to hide his identity so that way they wouldn’t figure out he was kidnapped

Circles home that’s my mama Nas she’s not home and he goes to me and gets all the information

May we had a big problem now Teri has come back to Nas and told her what’s going on with the social worker at school and now they’re trying to figure out a plan to fix this whole debacle

Wow, Nas disappeared on them and Terry’s looking for his mother everywhere because he knows that the social worker and his teachers are supposed to be coming to see him. He’s calling around freaking out can’t find her next thing you know honey baby his teacher/social worker shows up at his house with the police and the caseworker and all these different people and leaving for Terry alone to have to explain what’s going on himself. Mind you he’s only 17 years old. so now she’s telling Terry. Hey, have you seen your mother? Where is she? What’s going on he says what is she gonna get in trouble? Does it even matter I’m about to turn 18 a few weeks and she said well Terry I hate to tell you this, but she’s not even your biological mother.

Honestly, when I first saw this movie and I keep repeating it because when I first saw this movie, I thought initially that this was going to be the case that she wasn’t his biological mother but then, as I started to look at the movie after I’ve seen the commercial about 25,000 times I thought OK well, maybe this really is my logical mother because it seems like they’ve known each other their whole lives and now I’m in shock and I’m in all and I don’t know what else to do

Wow, my mind is literally blown. Maybe not literally but yeah I just got real

This is crazy because they recommend him to come to stay at a shelter and eventually runs away before he even gets to the shelter then he calls his friend and she tells him to go pick up the stuff so she could stay with him, so when goes to the house, 🐝🥳🥰Honey and S. is there looking for stuff trying to get out her last little things so she can leave and Teri confronts her and I knees is embarrassed and angry and bitter and scared and panicked, and she acts like she was trying to save them, but at the same time she acts like she doesn’t care Meanwhile, Terry is upset her and betrayed and feeling so sad. I feel so bad for him. His whole world is changing. He just lost lucky as a father figure because he died of cancer and now he’s losing the only mother he ever knew because he finds out she’s not even his real mother and he’s losing his home. It is bananas.

So now we go to the end of the movie where they have go their separate ways she promises that she’ll come back for him and it’s not goodbye, but it seems like it might be goodbye

"A Thousand and One" Isn't a True Story, but It Pulls From Writer-Director A.V. Rockwell's Experiences

I’ll give this story AK movie 110 out of 10. It is deep it is stop-revoking. It’s funny it’s real. There are parts of it that I can really relate to. There are other parts where I can really see someone else that I know going through this. It’s interesting it’s gritty it’s true to the color of a Northern woman. I love the reality of it. I feel like you definitely should check this out.