From Omeleto.
A man relapses.
LIQUOR BANK is used with permission from Marcellus Cox. Learn more at https://instagram.com/cellusworld24
Eddie is a former Marine who has been in recovery. But on the day when he should be celebrating his one-year milestone of sobriety, he relapses, drinking in his apartment alone, unable to bear his internal torment any longer.
Things feel hopeless and shameful for Eddie. But when his sponsor Baker shows up at his door, Baker holds him accountable and helps Eddie to see what the lifelong journey of recovery really looks like.
Directed and written by Marcellus Cox, this compelling short drama is focused on a single, painful day in the life of a recovering alcoholic. The day should be a triumph for Eddie, marking one year sober. Instead, he relapses and is held accountable by his sponsor, who refuses to give up on Eddie. Their tough, searching conversation is equal parts tough love and tender compassion, and it forms the heart of this raw, emotional portrait of the twisting, challenging path of sobriety and recovery.
The storytelling is primarily a two-hander, focused on dialogue between two characters in a compressed setting and putting the spotlight on the layered, dimensional writing and performances. It unspools in real-time, introducing us to Eddie at his lowest point as he’s discovered by his worried sponsor. Baker is both disappointed and unsurprised by Eddie’s lapse, and he deals with it in a manner that’s sometimes matter-of-fact and sometimes exasperated, but we get the sense that Baker has been where Eddie is now.
The exchanges between the two men are raw, unpolished, and painfully human: Eddie downplays his drinking, dances around accountability, and retreats behind bravado, while Baker presses him with tough love, balancing sternness with compassion and understated tenderness at times. As Eddie and Baker, actors Antwone Barnes and Sean Alexander James, respectively, have a richly layered dynamic, and each performer is unafraid of going to vulnerable, gnarly places. Eddie is more volatile and Baker has an unvarnished authority born of experience, but each character has a dark place within him — and now one must help the other out of it.
Their dynamic feels lived-in, as does the film’s look and feel, with muted cinematography and a directorial eye that emphasizes the claustrophobia and shadows of Eddie’s domestic environment. But it’s intimate, and there’s nowhere for Eddie to hide, even as he pushes Baker away more and more insistently. When that push becomes violent, it tests both men and their covenant to one another.
Based on a true story, LIQUOR BANK is less a story of triumph than one of endurance, rooted in real experience and vulnerability and told with heart and humanity. It is a powerful evocation of how fragile sobriety is, and how one weak moment can still unleash a torrent of shame that can undo months of discipline. In this film, recovery is not a single milestone, but the willingness to keep going, again and again, and that journey is a difficult slog at times. It also offers the unique perspective of a Black man in recovery, acknowledging the particular burdens Eddie carries, including the silence of shame and the cultural stigma of vulnerability. But it also highlights the vital role that connection plays, and how others help us summon our courage and resilience, sitting with us in our darkest moments and helping us move forward.
