REVIEW. NICKEL BOYS: Worth a look, even if the view isn't always clear.

Back in 1990, the often acerbic New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael snidely commented that first time director Kevin Costner's new epic revisionist western, Dances With Wolves, should have been called "Plays With the Camera," because of what she perceived as Costner's overly deliberate, distracting camera shots. I've seen the movie several times since, and each time I try to be more aware of her assessment, but - after over thirty years - I still can't see where the camera detracts from the narrative or the story.

That said, first time directors are sometimes guilty of being overly ambitious (re: trying to do too many things to show their skill rather than simply telling a story). Just like academics, directors can overthink and the results are sometimes less than effective. Nickel Boys, the first feature film director/co-writer RaMell Ross (he previously directed the 2018 Oscar-nominated documentary, Hale County This Morning), doesn't completely lapse into self-indulgent camera tricks, but his hyper use of flashbacks and flash forwards, punctuated with elaborate visuals, sometimes distracts from the storytelling.

And what a powerful story it is. Based on Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer-Prize winning 2019 novel, The Nickel Boys which, in turn, is based on the infamous Dozier School (here called the Nickel Academy), a Florida reform school that operated for over a hundred years before investigations exposing decades of emotional and physical abuse toward its students was discovered. The movie begins in Tallahassee, Florida in1962 and centers on two Nickel Academy students: Elwood (newcomer Ethan Herisse), a quiet, academically promising teen whose teacher encourages him to apply to a local college where he'll get one year of tuition-free at an HBCU (Historically Black College/University), and Turner (Brandon Wilson), another quiet, but more street-savvy student he meets at the Nickel Academy.

Elwood is en route to his college admission test when he hitches a ride, an unfortunate decision as the driver has just stolen a car, and Elwood is sent to Nickel as punishment for his involvement. Despite attempts by his grandmother Hattie (a poignant and Oscar-worthy Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor) to appeal his conviction, Elwood seems resigned to his fate but remains optimistic that the "system" will correct itself and send him home. Turner, on the other hand, doubts Elwood will be released and warns him that there are only a few ways to leave Nickel: 1) when you're too old, 2) if you bribe an administrator, 3) if you die, or 4) if you are killed. He suggests a fifth option - escape - but Elwood doesn't initially accept that option.

In flash forwards (this is not a spoiler), we see what appears to be an adult Elwood following news stories that are revealing the discovery of graves on the Nickel Academy site, and soon the remains of students who "disappeared" are found. We rarely see Elwood's face because, in one of his stylistic maneuvers, director Ross uses the camera to tell the story from various perspectives: Elwood's (in which we see lots of shoes and floors as Elwood typically looks down), Turner's (with more direct, observational and eye-level shots), and a finally, from a more omniscient angle that floats just above the action, not quite looking down, but slightly elevated above eye level.

Interspersed with these shots are snippets of images, sometimes memories, that either advance the story and/or suggest its metaphor. The most frequently used historical footage are the advancement of the NASA space program in the 1960s and the Civil Rights movement led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., both are interests of Elwood, and he follows these stories as meticulously as he keeps a diary of all the activities at Nickel. Turner knows the danger with what Elwood is doing and keeps an eye on his friend, even though he puts himself in danger in the process. Placing the injustices happening at Nickel against the technological and human rights activism of the 1960s emphasizes how actively backward some segments of American society were.

You can probably guess that the outcome of this story will not be happy (though I won't give away what may be a surprising reveal to some), but what is interesting is how Ross suggests the abuses at Nickel without actually showing them. We hear the abuse and we hear about the abuses, but we never see them. It is a powerful choice from Ross as it underscores the inhumanities against Nickel Boys in ways that are haunting and personal.

What sometimes doesn't work, though, is Ross arguably overuse of camera techniques, shifting from Elwood's perspective to Turner's without much adjustment, doling out some plot points piecemeal, and not completely developing motives for what happens. I don't mind non-linear storytelling (Quentin Tarantino is a master of this), but here the plot flow is choppy and intermittently tedious, the camera techniques sometimes jarring in ways that detract from advancing the emotional power of the story.

You would think that using the camera to show Elwood and Turner's views of the world would draw us in to each character, gaining deeper compassion for them and their situation. But rather than creating a stronger empathy, the camera techniques left me strangely detached from the characters and the story. What could have been an affective and touching message instead became a sort of intellectual exercise in cinematic storyboarding, bordering on being a tad pretentious at times.

Which is not to say that Nickel Boys is a bad film. It isn't. It is quite good and provocative in its subject and presentation. And it's been deservedly named to numerous critical "best" lists this year (save the BAFTA's longlist, which may be important as we move toward the Oscars). The cast of mostly unknown or little known actors is also not by accident (save one cameo at the end), which reinforces Ross' emphasis on theme/story and not performance.

Still, for some moviegoers, Ross' hyper-busy camera and imagery overload might create an unconsciously incongruous reaction to what is happening, making the climactic reveal less impactful and the movie less memorable. Comparatively speaking, 2016's Oscar-winning movie Moonlight and last year's Rustin were more successful leaving lasting impressions about racial and human injustices for me than Nickel Boys.

I have a code phrase for whenever I'm watching a movie where we sense the director might be overextending their need to impress the audience with a movie's gravitas, its special/significant importance. All I have to say is "Tree of Life," and my husband gets the reference: Terrence Malick's 2011's opus on life, love, the creation of the universe? You name it, Malick made sure you got every allusion, every metaphor, every symbolic image. Even the actor Sean Penn, who co-starred in the film, thought the final cut was an excessive mess.

Though not nearly close to Malick's visual debauchery, RaMell Ross is clearly a filmmaker to watch, so hopefully, he will learn to show a bit more technical restraint in future film projects. In the case of Nickel Boys, a bit less might have yielded a lot more in terms of a more emotional, even spiritual impact long after the credits role.

Nickel Boys is currently in limited release in theaters.