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26

I have not sobbed as hard and as consistently at a movie as I did at the last ten minutes of this. I thought it wouldn't get me because I predicted the ending about halfway through, but it fucking shook me. And now I'm sitting on the couch, thinking about it, and crying more.

Small detail that kind of fucked me up was how often the camera would turn away from something, not horizontally, but by turning to the floor. Keeping its gaze downward. Staying out of trouble. A survival instinct black boys know well. I don't really know how to sit with any of this without crying even more.

24

You can freeze this movie at any moment of its 139 minutes and see an image that tells a story. Danger on a dark street. A magnet sliding down a fridge. An open seat in a car. A ceiling fan. A cane poking a bare chest. A wooden cross tied to a truck scraping the pavement. The cover of a book. A grandmother’s face. Space. A Google search. A bar patron you haven’t seen in years. Sidney Poitier.

It’s a movie that doesn’t force you to look at everything because it sees everything for you, from the hell on earth to whatever is beyond it. It constrains our view the same way we do. The same is true if you…

Review by James (Schaffrillas) ★★★★

Occasionally difficult to emotionally connect with due to the first person perspective, but equally difficult to deny how bold its storytelling style truly is. How the hell was this not in the conversation for Best Director, Editing, and Sound?!

10

I don’t precisely know what I mean by this, but I don’t think this movie’s first person conceit is meant to capture the world as it is seen but rather the world as it is ed, and I think it does that just about perfectly.

Review by davidehrlich ★★★★★

A leaf twirls through a pair of Black fingers. A deck of playing cards is bridged together in extreme close-up. A dry-cleaned suit hangs out the window of a parked car like it’s waiting for its body to come back. A boy named Elwood studies his reflection in his grandmother’s steaming iron, and later in the window display of the local Tallahassee electronic shop whose TVs are broadcasting a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr. The year is 1962, Jim Crow laws are still in full effect across the South, and young Elwood Curtis (Ethan Herisse) can’t help but see himself in the world around him — he can’t help but think he can change it.

In the news, Elwood…

4

took me some time to settle into the style, but as soon as i did, i was engrossed until the end. the filmmaking has this ineffable hypnotic quality that commands you to live alongside the characters instead of simply ively watching the story unfold, and it’s impossible to shake even after the credits roll. jomo fray’s consuming cinematography is the true star of the show though, which not only places us right in the thick of the plot but also ensures that we see, hear, and feel everything these boys do as well, exactly as they do - a 4D cinematic experience created by an emotionally attentive camera alone, with no further bells and whistles needed.

5

I’ll write more on this one later I think but it’s been exciting to watch a potentially important director discovering himself in real time; conceptually bold, emotionally rich, politically charged and not only confident enough to make an audience meet it on its own , but generous enough to reward that sense of engagement.

Review by davidehrlich ★★★★★

The 25 Best Films of 2024: A Video Countdown

Please my fundraiser for the Palestine Red Crescent Society here.

4

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

5

major, major, major

3

It’s not a gimmick

Immaculately put together, stunningly shot, brilliantly acted, creatively jaw dropping; Nickel Boys shines through as an ambitious way to tell such a heartbreaking story.

The decision to present everything through first person pov continuously awe’s and wow’s throughout its plus 2 hour runtime. Constantly showing increasingly clever ways to play with the audiences expectations, it’s technologically brilliant. Not since Enter The void (2009) have I been purposefully sucked in to the characters mind in this way, it’s hauntingly immersive.

6

“Where… where shall we rest?”

Immense.

Redefines our place as the audience. Not only visually, but aurally as well. Breaths that sound like your own. Images that are so distinct and draped in a dreamy haze. Fuzzy edges and shy glances, less fractured memory, more a very specific perspective. It’s truly just an unbelievably staggering experience of a film. Unapologetically bold in its construction and confident in the artistic rewards it offers.

Perhaps one of the most powerful end results is that this will feel like a totally different film on a rewatch. Every moment recontextualized and heightened by its very inclusion. The sanctity of an image amplified tenfold.

“They’ve grown into the heart of the wood.”