Tony is a young man, raised by an abusive father, and is part of a group of young rebels that are taking justice in their own hands. Even so, Tony is not like them – though he is muscular and slightly violent when nature calls, he is also kind and always looks at the others with the hidden innocence of a rookie. At first, he wants to be a bad boy just like his friends are, but he ends up being just another one from the herd; as the story goes by, we learn that he gets initiated in this lifestyle and becomes not just one of them, but the one others look up to.

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In ‘Tony’ the construction of the characters is spotless. The character Tony (played flawlessly by Hugo Diego Garcia, who is also the director) resembles very much Vincent Martino from the hit series ‘The Deuce’. In ‘The Deuce’, Vincent is a bartender who gets involved with the mob, and even in times of extreme corruption and the rise of prostitution and pornography, he manages to keep a balance and always be the balanced one who refuses to go all the way into the mob-business while keeping his consciousness clear. Tony is quite similar – he keeps a perfect balance between madness and sanity, he is calm when the situation calls and acts accordingly when words are not enough to take out the fire. The parallel between these two characters is worth mentioning, from our point of view, and to go even further we may say that even the other characters resemble part of the cast from the aforementioned hit series. The explanation for this is simple as to focus on bad boys and madness fueled actions is a winning solution. Numerous examples throughout the years have proven so:  ‘A Clockwork Orange’, ‘American History X’, to name a few.

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‘Tony’ may be one of the best and most consistent shorts we’ve seen this year as it builds impeccably on the pathological expression of the human self. Well-balanced and written in the most natural way possible, 'Tony' shines like a diamond from the beginning until the end.

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Written by Vlad A. Gheorghiu