23/10

Ellwood Curtis’ college dream crumbles alongside a two-lane Florida highway. Bearing the weight of an innocent mistake, he is sentenced to Nickel Academy, a brutal correctional facility sunk deep in the Jim Crow South. He encounters another ward, the all-seeing Turner. The two black teenagers form an alliance: Turner dispenses fundamental survival advice, Ellwood clings to his optimistic world view. Against the backdrop of the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement, Ellwood and Turner’s existence appears far from the flamboyant oratory of the Reverend Martin Luther King. Despite Nickel’s brutality, Ellwood tries to hold on to his humanity, awakening a new vision for Turner.