Written by: RaMell Ross & Joslyn Barnes
Starring: Ethan Herisse, Brandon Wilson, Hamish Linklater, Fred Hechinger, Daveed Diggs
Rating: [4/5]
Quite often films receive praise for providing a level of immersion to the audience through their storytelling. Filmmakers have accomplished this through various means but none to the degree of what RaMell Ross accomplishes in Nickel Boys. A bold piece of direction that while I found at times distracted from the narrative still deserves endless praise as it tells both a heartwarming and tragic story.
Following getting involved in a wrong place, wrong time circumstance, Elwood (Ethan Herisse) gets sent to a reform school called Nickel Academy. While there, he befriends Turner (Brandon Wilson) as they both navigate the terrible conditions of this academy during a difficult time for Black boys in the Jim Crow South.
Both the main selling point and the defining feature of Nickel Boys lies with its presentation of the camera providing a first-person perspective to Elwood’s and Turner’s experiences both in youth but also later in adulthood for the former. It creates a level of immersion like no other that puts us right in the shoes of these characters as they experience life for all its beauty and terror. We get those moments where Elwood sits in a bus and receives stares from individuals who judge him solely because of his skin color where it pierces right through you just like it does the young boy. It helps craft this genuine empathy as we see the world through his eyes.
However, when deciding to have the entire narrative through this lens, it comes with the trade-off of having this story feel quite limited and having this focus bring some distraction. Now, I can fully admit that perhaps this comes down to user error by me, but after a while the impracticality of this filmmaking method began to bear its weight. No other sequence captures this more than a scene at a boxing match Elwood and Turner attend where the camera does not align with what one would imagine the eyes of Elwood would drift towards. Moments where he should be watching the action in front of him, but his eyes wander away for no discernible or impactful reason. These moments took me out of the story and just had me question why Ross made these decisions, which I doubt was his intention.
With all that said, he still manages to still carry this magic, especially when we view the journey both Elwood and Tuner go through together. It gets interspersed with cuts to the future, where Elwood discovers the atrocities that transpired in that very Academy. A way of looking into a dark and painful path while we live it as well when we cut back into the moments of youth. The friendship between this pair creates this earnest feeling of care as they find commonalities in what they want for themselves in life. Switching between their perspective highlights the way they not only view their surroundings but also each other as friends. Each of these interactions creates moments to cherish, which makes the tragedy happening around them all the more painful as they attempt to find rehabilitation in a place not really offering it. Elwood has to battle the realities of a criminal justice system making it impossible for him to escape a situation where he bore no responsibility but still got roped into. The fact this film could capture both this beautiful euphoria and the inextricable sadness displays the great work by RaMell Ross and his team.
I would be remiss not to give plenty of praise to our two leads, Ethan Herisse and Brandon Wilson, as they navigate this treacherous road for their characters and serve as both our eyes into this story but also the mirror to each other. Their exchanges exhibit what makes this story special, and the actors play an integral role in creating the lasting impact of the story. They each bring a genuineness and softness to their roles and exemplifies the empathy this narrative seeks to conjure through its first-person perspective. Both Herisse and Wilson perfectly fit into these roles, which makes the moments, like the one highlighted in the poster, so gratifying. Seeing their shared joy together and not separated by that perspective of them looking at one another only further impactful. I truly hope to see even more of this pair as these roles should give them more notice.
Creating both a frustrating but even more gratifying experience, Nickel Boys has its imperfections due to its commitment to its visual approach to the narrative but its boldness and earnest attempt deserves praise. While it distracted at times, RaMell Ross and his team deliver something so beautifully constructed that brings such a genuinely gratifying viewing experience truly like no other. Revolutionary at its core, we’ve never seen something like this film and while others may mimic it, I find it difficult to believe anyone will do any better.
Films with Josh 
