Short Takes on One of Them Days and some other cinematic topics
Mama Knew There’d Be Days Like This
Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, though better options may be coming soon. (Note: Anything in bold blue [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)
My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”
(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the song’s name)
This will be just a SHORT TAKES posting this week because a lot of other activities have piled up for me including some major dental work for my wife, Nina (you need to beware of any unanticipated high deduction costs [Wow!]), along with successful time spent watching our local (San Francisco) Golden State Warriors play in the 2025 postseason where they currently hold a 3-2 games advantage (best of 7 wins the series) over fiercely-thuggish Houston Rockets, so once again California is getting my approval over Texas. However, don’t let these abbreviated comments give you any sense of disinterest in One of Them Days, one of the funniest movies I’ve seen in a long time (go here [contains Spoilers of course] if you want considerably more plot detail than I’m providing now).
SHORT TAKES
Here’s the trailer:
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size;
activate the same button or use “esc” keyboard key to return to normal.)
If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
L.A. waitress Dreux Jones (Keke Palmer) and aspiring-painter Alyssa (SZA) are roommates (in a dumpy apartment complex [pieces of their ceiling keep falling down] where Dreux’s Mama Ruth [Vanessa Bell Calloway] lives in another apartment) and long-time friends (ongoing clashes keep their relationship somewhat out of balance), both hoping for better lives as Dreux wants to be a manager for her restaurant franchise. On the day of her late-afternoon interview, though, chaos erupts when landlord Uche (Rizi Timane) tells Dreux their $1,500 rent hasn’t been paid so they have until 6pm to rectify the problem or they’ll be evicted, all their belongings put out on the curb that night. Dreux’s confused because she gave the money to Alyssa to pay, but for some reason she passed the cash on to her live-in boyfriend (who pays no rent!) Keshawn (Joshua Neal) to give to the landlord, then they learn later he invested their cash in his ready-to-launch (?) T-shirt company. When they track him down, he’s cheating on Alyssa with muscular Bernice (Aziza Scott) who gets hit with a car door during the total confusion that occurs; she vows revenge on our protagonist women.
Desperate to get the rent, Dreux and Alyssa try a loan-shark company but are rejected for abysmally low credit scores, then Dreux tries donating blood; that goes wrong too, with her blood spurting all over the place, no payment made. Miraculously, Alyssa sees a pair of expensive sneakers on a utility wire, climbs up the pole to retrieve them, gets electrocuted, yet she and Dreux escape from the ambulance, allowing Dreux to get to her interview while Alyssa sells the shoes for $1,500. This day couldn’t end well, though, as Keshawn and Bernice find Alyssa outside Dreux’s interview, a fight happens among the 3 women resulting in Dreux’s good vibes with the interviewers cancelled, Bernice grabbing the $1,500, after which the gals get a call from fierce gangster King Lolo (Amin Joseph), original owner of the shoes who wants $5,000 by 10pm that night. ⇒They return home to find their stuff already on the curb with new neighbor Bethany (Maude Apatow) wanting to buy an Alyssa painting so they quickly advertise an impromptu outdoor art gallery where they sell enough to pay all their expenses, Dreux gets a second chance from one of her interviewers, while Alyssa comes up with a plan to get rid of King Lolo by turning him in to the loan-shark folks as he’s one of their worst clients. He still ends up in their apartment ready to kill everyone until he’s knocked out by a chunk of ceiling even as candles Keshawn set out put the place on fire; firefighters arrive, one of them being their friend Maniac (Patrick Cage) who shows interest in Dreux as Alyssa breaks it off with Keshawn, becomes a successful artist; Dreux also triumphs as a hit with her new career.⇐
Admittedly, the constant mishaps for these befuddled friends on such an eventful day are the stuff of pushing comedy to its limits as situations keep escalating, trouble seems to be never-ending, although you constantly feel these main characters are too decent, too likable for tragedy to ultimately befall them, so even if the rapid-fire events depicted may seem over-the-top in retrospect the constant pace connected to effective acting makes this a most enjoyable diversion to watch. The CCAL agrees: Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews are at a whopping 94%, usually-more-sedate Metacritic average score at 71%. One of Them Days was released domestically (U.S.-Canada) on January 17, 2025, made $50 million ($52 million worldwide), can now be found on streaming where it’s free to Netflix subscribers (you can sign up for $17.99 monthly) or can be rented for $5.99 from Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV+, a choice to make I think you’d find to be a consistent delight.
As usual, I’ll finish with a Musical Metaphor which this time with be 2 songs because I’ve shortchanged you so much on providing much of a review of this entertaining movie. The first is reflective of the problems our troubled women faced on that fateful day (and notes how supportive Dreux’s mother was to daughter’s aspirations), “Mama Said” (on the 1961 album The Shirelles Sing to Trumpets and Strings) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L842mz-tNBQ because: “My eyes were wide open / But all that I can see is / Chapel bells are callin’ / For everyone but me / But I don’t worry ‘cause / Mama said there’ll be days like this / There’ll be days like this, my mama said.” Yet, for when things get better here's Van Morrison’s “Days Like This” (on his 1995 album named for the song) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UUWkr4FUlo: “When all the parts of the puzzle / Start to look like they fit / Then I must remember/ There’ll be days like this.” We’ve all likely had “one of them days” at some point in our lives (hopefully, not too many of them, even as they can be hard to control), so I think you can easily empathize with Dreux and Alyssa to enjoy spending a properly-concise time with this movie. (Please note, Agent Orange, no DEI here as I made no point of most of these characters being Black [though the photos do perform that task]; it's just a bunch of [Black] actors doing their jobs quite well. [You know: Like Jackie Robinson, Colin Powell… and on and on].)
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
Some options for your consideration: (1) IMDb's Five Things to Watch on the week of 4/28/2025; (2) Theatrical releases now available for streaming; and (3) Current top streamers on Netflix.
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