From director RaMell Ross (Academy Award-nominated Hale County This Morning, This Evening) and based on the Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Colson Whitehead, Nickel Boys chronicles the powerful friendship between two young Black teenagers navigating the harrowing trials of reform school together in Florida.
Elwood Curtis's (Ethan Herisse) college dream shatters alongside a two-lane Florida highway. Bearing the brunt of an innocent misstep, he's sentenced to the netherworld of Nickel Academy, a brutal reformatory sunk deep in the Jim Crow South. He encounters another ward, the seen-it-all Turner (Brandon Wilson). The two Black teens strike up an alliance: Turner dispensing fundamental tips for survival, Elwood, clinging to his optimistic worldview. Backdropped by the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement, Elwood and Turner’s existence appear worlds away from Rev. Martin Luther King's burnished oratory. Despite Nickel's brutality, Elwood strives to hold onto his humanity, awakening a new vision for Turner.