Using a subjective camera throughout, RaMell Ross' "Nickel Boys" shows us its world through the eyes of, not one but both , it's principal protagonists, (Elwood and Turner), as they struggle to survive life in the Nickel Academy, a 'reform' school run like a concentration camp and it betrays its director's origins in documentary film-making. On the one hand it's something of a visual marvel but it's also a difficult watch and not always an easy film to like or empathize with which is probably the very antithesis of what Ross intended.
This is a 'clever' film, clearly aimed at an art-house audience and magnificently photographed by Jomo Fray in the Academy ratio but the technique leaves no room for the actors to express themselves, (someone's always talking directly to the camera or, as in a lengthy scene near the end, being observed by the camera in a single take).
This is a pity because the technique detracts from what the film is really about, namely the horrors of the Academy, and because there is still a lot to admire here. I mean, if you are going to adapt a Pulitzer Prize winning book for the screen this is as original a way of doing it as any but it's also likely to alienate many of its audience. Worth seeing, certainly, but far from the masterpiece 'Little White Lies' and other critical publications think it is.
