Marcellus Cox has an impressive collection of short films under his belt and has been nominated for numerous awards, but his latest film Mickey Hardaway, now showing on Prime is his first full length venture, and it is a film that certainly packs a punch. Shot in stylish monochrome which disguises the low budget production, the film echoes Charles Burnett’s seminal Killer of Sheep (1978) and pays homage in the use of Working-Class L.A. suburbs and performances in a social realist style. In certain shots it even has touches of Francis Ford Coppola’s Rumblefish (1983). The story is told through the meetings of a young black cartoonist and his therapist. Flashbacks reveal Mickey’s (Rashad Hunter) difficult childhood at the hands of school bullies and an abusive father, and later at the hands ...