Prime Video quietly adds one of this year’s Best Picture contenders ahead of the Oscars

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Prime Video has added one of this year’s Oscars Best Picture nominees to its service.

In the competition for a distinguished honor, “Nickel Boys,” directed by RaMell Ross, is being considered alongside other contenders such as “The Brutalist,” “Conclave,” “The Substance,” and “Emilia Pérez.

Told through a first-person perspective, the novel “Nickel Boys” narrates the tale of two African American adolescents, Elwood and Turner, who end up in a harsh and abusive reformatory in Florida during the 1960s.

Watch Nickel Boys on Prime Video

The movie draws influence from the actual Dozier School for Boys, which shut down in 2011, and over time became infamous due to allegations of mistreating its pupils.

After debuting at the Telluride Film Festival and a brief cinema release, the movie titled “Nickel Boys” was recognized as one of the best 10 films in 2024 by the American Film Institute.

This work has received multiple award nominations, such as a nomination for the Golden Globe awards and two nominations this year in the categories of Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay at the Oscars.

The movie is currently rated 91% on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics have agreed that the film’s unique directorial style in adapting Colson Whitehead’s powerful novel may be surprising for some, but the immersive quality of Nickel Boys makes you feel like you’re walking a mile in someone else’s shoes.

The movie “Nickel Boys” draws inspiration from the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel penned by Colson Whitehead, and according to Ross, this literary acclaim brought an additional layer of challenge during the filmmaking journey.

He shared with Shifter Magazine that the situation carried extra weight, not so much about delivering perfection, but rather because it represented a rare chance. He expressed concern that if he didn’t succeed, it might discourage others from being offered similar opportunities in the future.

It appeared as though this might be an unprecedented opportunity, given that not many African Americans have been granted the same freedom of creative expression in writing a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel as I have.

“So if I didn’t do a bad job then maybe someone else would and that seems like the biggest honour.”

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2025-02-27 14:19