The fall festival season continues to take marvelous shape, as Film at Lincoln Center has today announced that RaMell Ross’ “Nickel Boys” will open the 62nd New York Film Festival, taking place at Alice Tully Hall on the evening of September 27. The adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel stars Ethan Herisse, Brandon Wilson, Hamish Linklater, Fred Hechinger, Daveed Diggs, and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor.
Per Monday’s announcement, “Rare is the film of a major book that maintains the power and precision of its source material while also generating its own singular aesthetic. Yet RaMell Ross’ extraordinary realization of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize–winning 2019 novel, about two Black teenagers who become wards of a barbaric juvenile reformatory in Jim Crow–era Florida, achieves just this.”
Stars Herisse and Wilson are both billed as turning in “breakout performances that cut to the bone,” as the film follows the pair, “whose close friendship helps sustain their hope even as the horrors mount around them at the Nickel Academy, which becomes a microcosm of American racism in the mid-20th century.”
In an official statement, Ross shared, “What an absolute honor for ‘Nickel Boys’ to open the 62nd New York Film Festival… a daydream really, for the crew, the cast, and team who’ve committed so wholeheartedly to its vision. It feels almost full circle, given ‘Hale County This Morning, This Evening’s selection in 2018’s New Directors/New Films program. The New York Film Festival in particular constellates much of what one aspires toward through filmic production. Since just after my undergrad when I was wooed by the still and moving image, it has been an extraordinary compendium for global aesthetics.”
NYFF‘s artistic director Dennis Lim added in his own statement, “’Nickel Boys’ signals the emergence of a major filmmaking voice. RaMell Ross’ fiction debut, like his previous work in photography and documentary, searches for new ways of seeing and, in so doing, expands the possibilities of visual language. It’s the most audacious American movie I have seen in some time, and we are excited and honored to open the New York Film Festival with it.”
The film marks lauded Oscar-nominated filmmaker Ross’ first foray into narrative filmmaking after his “Hale County This Morning, This Evening,” and today’s announcement notes that, for his new fact-based drama, he “has here fashioned a film of equal daring and intensity, buoyed by expressive, shallow-focus cinematography by Jomo Fray (‘All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt’), pinpoint-precise editing by Nicholas Monsour (‘Nope’), and deeply felt supporting performances from Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, Hamish Linklater, and Daveed Diggs.”
The NYFF Main Slate selection committee is chaired by Dennis Lim, NYFF Artistic Director, and includes Florence Almozini, Justin Chang, K. Austin Collins, and Rachel Rosen. The 62nd edition of the festival has been extended by a day, and now takes place September 27 – October 14, 2024. More programming announcements are expected in the coming days, including news on the Closing Night film later this week.
Amazon MGM Studios’ Orion Pictures will release “Nickel Boys” in theaters on Friday, October 25.
