Director A.V. Rockwell first garnered international buzz when her 2018 short film, Feathers, dominated the Sundance Festival, leading the movie to be acquired by Searchlight and qualifying it for the Oscars. Now her most recent work, A Thousand and One, is generating even bigger talks of being a standout star in next year’s award season.
A Thousand and One – which recently won the Grand Jury Prize for the U.S. Dramatic Competition – explores the riveting journey of a tenacious Harlem woman who kidnaps her child from foster care and raises him on her own. The movie is set from 1994 to 2005, and walks audiences through the passage of Inez, (the lead character played by Teyana Taylor) as she maneuvers through gentrification, racism and the intimate relationship between a mother and son.
In a recent interview with IndieWire, Rockwell sat down with the publication to discuss the lead-up to this momentous time in her career trajectory, explaining that with her debut feature, she was “trying to fill a gap.”
“The way that gentrification was reshaping New York City and me, especially observing that it didn’t feel supernatural,” Rockwell said. “It wasn’t like every aspect of the city was changing. It felt like certain neighborhoods were being targeted. I loved the city so deeply that it felt like part of who I am, and I felt like, OK, well, New York must not love me in the same way.”
She continued: “I think that awareness of unreciprocated love and that feeling of being erased was a huge motivator for me. In addition to that, I felt like the experiences of Black women in society were overlooked — not only within society, though, but even within our own communities and families. I felt the need to speak on that.”
Rockwell went on to explain that as much as New York was rife with many economic, social justice and racial issues, she would never lose hope in the city that raised her and gave her the gusto to create the film, although she does admit that “I have a right to have a relationship with it that’s a little complicated,” but “I won’t ever lose hope on New York. I’m always going to be a New Yorker.”
Growing up, the Queen native said that she loved watching how Spike Lee and Martin Scorsese would treat the art of storytelling, weaving in fiction and real life to produce content that would capture the hearts and minds of moviegoers for generations to come.
“I recall [Lee and Scorsese] a lot,” Rockwell said. “As a filmmaker I’m constantly gaining new favorite films but I think they were the filmmakers who had a huge influence on me. What’s great about them if I can look at careers that are admirable was that not only had they made all types of films, and I respect them for that, these are artists who always had a strong voice.”
A Thousand and One, set to be released March 31, is just the beginning for Rockwell, although she said before she thinks about what’s next, she just wants to sit in the moment of the film’s release.
“At the end of the day, I did this for audiences, regardless of what they take away from it. I make movies to reach people in a way that makes life easier even if it’s just for two hours.”
