Nickel Boys is an historical drama based on the 2019 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Colson Whitehead (who also won a Pulitzer Prize for The Underground Railroad). The novel and the film are based on events that took place at the Dozier School for Boys, a reform school in Florida; in the story it is called the Nickel Academy.
The time is 1962 during the Jim Crow era. Elwood Curtis (Ethan Herisse) is a bright African-American youth with a promising future. He lives with his grandmother (Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor). They are both excited when he gets admitted to a free technical college, but hitchhiking to the campus, he unwittingly gets into a stolen car. When the police stop the driver, Elwood is assumed to be his accomplice. He is sent to the Nickel Academy. There he is told that if he obeys all the rules and does the work assigned to him, he may eventually be able to go home.
He learns from another young man at Nickel, Turner (Brandon Wilson), that they are not likely to get out. Already cynical from what he knows about the place, Turner shows Elwood a sweatbox under the roof where boys are sent for punishment. They can both hear the sounds of boys being beaten behind closed doors. All the boys are being used as convict labor, enriching the school authorities. Their future is bleak.
Elwood and his grandmother, who have been inspired by the civil rights movement and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., try to take a legal route to his freedom, but they are unsuccessful. Turner convinces his friend that they must try to escape.
Director RaMell Ross has chosen an unusual approach to telling this story. We see everything through the eyes of either Elwood or Turner. In the beginning, we, along with Elwood, gaze at the beauty of nature (through the outstanding cinematography of Jomo Fray). Later, we bear witness with each boy to the corrupt and brutal nature of what is going on at Nickel. For example, with them, we realize that Griff (Luke Tennie) will likely be killed for not taking a dive in a boxing match that the school administrator has bet on.
Many films encourage us to walk in a character’s shoes. This one goes further by only showing us the story through the characters’ eyes, thus giving us access to a high level of empathy. For those not familiar with the Jim Crow South in the United States, this is an important and solid history lesson. For all of it, it is a call to honor those who unjustly suffered due to racism and economic and cultural inequality.