2024 – Nickel Boys
This was an interestingly filmed movie, but it was difficult to watch, not because of its story content, which I really liked, but because of the way in which it was filmed. Though it is certainly not the first movie to ever do it, the movie was shot using a first-person perspective. It was supposed to be as if we, the viewers, were seeing things through the actual eyes of the main protagonist. Now, don’t get me wrong. I applaud the director for choosing to make the movie this way. It doesn’t just show the view the story like most movies do. Instead, it forces the viewers to watch the story as if they, themselves are part of the narrative.
The problem with this is that it is physically uncomfortable to watch. Much of the camerawork had the constant shaky motion of a handheld camera, which, after a while, tends to give me a stomach ache. If the character was lying on his side in a bed, the camera was angled sideways in a disorienting way. And the camera wasn’t always focused on a person’s face or the action taking place in a scene. Instead, if the character is looking at his feet, that was all we got to see. We could hear what was going on, but that was all. If he is talking to someone, but not looking at them, we don’t get to see who is talking. And I think a certain portion of the film’s emotional content was lost because we couldn’t see the face of the person through whose eyes we are supposed to be looking.
But like I said, the story was good and engaging. It was about the strong friendship that developed between two black boys at Nickel Reform School in the 1960s. The school was in Florida, and was of course, segregated, and the horrible abuse and frequent murders of the students by the corrupt staff. After watching the film, I was not surprised to learn that the fictional Nickel was based on a real school known as Dozier School for Boys, a place where such unforgivable abuses actually took place. Most of the victims were black.
The two boys, Ellwood and Turner, played by Ethan Herisse and Brandon Wilson, quickly become friends. Elwood is there because of a crime he didn’t commit. One of my favorite characters in the movie was the woman who raised Elwood, his grandmother, Hattie, wonderfully played by Anjanue Ellis-Taylor. She is certainly a supporting character, but she seemed to steal the scene every time she was on the screen. She was so beautifully real and earnest in her love for her grandson.
Turner was more cynical than the cerebral Ellwood, believing in the worst in others and in the school, and he was rarely disappointed. The two boys looked after each other and supported each other to get through the dangerous experience of being at the school. And after seeing the first half of the movie through Elwood’s eyes, the second half changes the perspective, allowing us to often see and experience the story through Turner’s eyes. There were only a few scenes in which the two are having a conversation, where the perspective keeps changing from one boy’s eyes to the other, making the narrative unfold like a regular film.
Both the lead actors did a really good job, but it was pretty much impossible to tell if they had a good on-screen chemistry, since they were only on the screen at the same time once. In the scene, the two were looking into a mirror together. That was it. They were clearly good friends, but I had difficulty gauging the emotional connection between the two actors.
Another aspect of the narrative was the non-linear story-telling. There were scenes where we jump into the future and follow the life of Ellwood after he has grown into adulthood. He is a man who has his own business and a wife. We see him using the internet to research the School and the murderous crimes that were regularly committed there. There is an official investigation in the media that is asking for witnesses. Ellwood eventually decides to testify. These future scenes were shot just slightly different than the rest of the movie. Instead of looking through Ellwood’s eyes, the camera is fixed on the back of his head, showing things from his perspective, except that now we are separated from him. There is a disconnect.
And I think the twist ending of the story explains this inconsistency. While at the reform school, Turner learns that Ellwood is to be quietly executed by the school officials for unsuccessfully trying to inform the public about what has been happening at Nickel. To save his friend, Turner plans an emergency jailbreak. The two are quickly tracked down, and as they run, Ellwood is shot and killed. Turner escapes, and when he grows to manhood, he takes Ellwood’s name. He also takes his convictions and his courage, which allows him to testify against the atrocities that he survived at Nickel. It was a good movie, and again, I applaud director RaMell Ross for choosing to make the movie from the first person perspective, first that of Ellwood, and then that of Turner. It was a bold choice, and it worked for the story that was being told. However, it was, at times, a physically difficult movie to watch. But the story was good. The cast and the acting were good. And the attention to the 1960s period aesthetic were fantastic. This is definitely a must-see movie, as long as you can handle the shaky hand-held camera action.