By John Corrado

It’s rare to come across a film that feels like it is reinventing the form. Yet, in bringing Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Nickel Boys to the screen, director RaMell Ross takes a radically new approach to adapting a novel; he presents the entire film from the perspective of his characters, through unique, point-of-view camerawork.

By presenting this engaging, often traumatic story from the direct perspective of protagonists Elwood (Ethan Herisse) and Turner (Brandon Wilson), two Black boys who become friends at Florida reformatory school Nickel Academy circa 1962, Ross allows us to engage with the material in a unique way.

There have been films that used this first-person, POV approach before, but rarely for such dramatic purposes. In an ingenious stroke, Ross also allows for shifting perspectives of the two lead characters, as if the camera is being handed back and forth between them. It’s a mix of cinematic rule-breaking and reinvention, with actors speaking directly to the camera and looking into the lens.

Elwood, who we see being raised by his grandmother Hattie (Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor) in the early scenes, is a promising student in the Jim Crow South, who gets sent to Nickel Academy through an unfortunate turn of events. Like so many reform schools of the day, it’s a harsh, unforgiving place, run with an iron first by the white administrator, Spencer (Hamish Linklater). But Elwood forms a bond with Turner, a fellow student, who has a more hopeful outlook.

Herisse and Wilson rise to the challenge of developing a meaningful friendship between their characters, often addressing the other one off-screen, as they interact primarily with the camera. We are engaging directly with their performances. Ellis-Taylor brings a caring presence to her scenes, that is projected right onto the audience. On top of it, the film also employs a fractured narrative, with scenes showing an adult Elwood (played by Daveed Diggs) still processing his trauma from these days, the camera following his perspective from the back of his head as he moves through the frame.

There is a documentary quality to it as well in terms of how filmmaker and subject interact, which is not surprising considering Ross’ non-fiction background; he previously directed the Oscar-nominated 2018 documentary Hale County This Morning, This Evening. The POV camerawork does take some adjusting to, but it’s a bold, often interesting choice, that allows Ross to make quite the cinematic statement with his narrative feature debut.

Working with cinematographer Jomo Fray, who frames everything in a square 1.33:1 aspect ratio, Ross develops his own cinematic language through the film. There are some impressively pulled off shots involving mirrors or other reflective surfaces that provide glimpses of the characters from their own point of view, as if they are seeing themselves. The camera movements are all carefully orchestrated and choreographed in accordance with the script, including key moments when the perspectives switch.

This POV technique could have been a gimmick, but is instead used to heighten the emotionality and immediacy of the story, through its most disturbing and heart-shattering moments. The result is one of the most technically ambitious and formally daring films of 2024.

Film Rating: ★★★½ (out of 4)

Nickel Boys opens exclusively in limited release on January 10th at TIFF Lightbox in Toronto, and will be expanding to more theatres on January 17th.