Mickey Hardaway – By Marcellus Cox – Short Film Review
Mickey Hardaway is an emotional look into the cruelty of the people around us when they see someone that’s different from them.
Director/Writer Marcellus Cox brings this character of Mickey Hardaway to life by means of effective, emotional and devastating circumstances. This film follows a day in the life of Mickey, a young sketch artist that’s surrounded by hate and darkness in his life. We see the hardships Mickey faces for being different than the people around him. This is most prominent with his interactions with a bully at school and with his own father.
It’s the methodical, well-directed confrontations that really bring this story to life. Marcellus Cox does such an effective job of making us as the audience feel immense sympathy for Mickey and hatred for the disturbed, moral-less characters around him. The confrontation with his father is what really pushes the story over the line in all the best ways possible.
The path to happiness comes in the form of a visit to therapy for Mickey Hardaway. In the short, Mickey goes to visit a well-renowned psychiatrist to help him deal with the chaos surrounding him. The hope and tonal shift this brings into the story is what makes this film really special. In such a short, efficient amount of time: The film manages to grow our sympathy for Mickey, our hatred for those that are cruel to him and our hope for this next step to lead to eventual happiness for Mickey.
Without giving away the ending too much, it does a beautiful job of leaving us wanting more. The story itself was wrapped up poetically and wonderfully, but it allows the film to feel like there’s plenty more story to tell, and I believe that is the plan for Director/Writer Marcellus Cox.
All-in-all, Mickey Hardaway was a wonderful short film with a lot of incredibly effective character depth, told very efficiently in the short form.
We very much look forward to seeing where Marcellus Cox goes next!