22/29

Elwood Curtis’ college dream falls apart on a two-lane Florida highway. Bearing the brunt of an innocent mistake, he is sentenced to the netherworld of Nickel Academy, a brutal reformatory sunk deep into the Jim Crow South. He meets another ward, Turner, who can see it. The two black youths form an alliance: Turner offers basic advice for survival, Ellwood clings to his optimistic worldview. Against the backdrop of the burgeoning civil rights movement, Ellwood and Turner’s existence was far from reverend. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Fiery Oratory. Despite Nickel’s brutality, Ellwood tries to retain his humanity, awakening a new vision for Turner.