TMW #15: Nickel Boys, A Real Pain and 2073 reviewed
The week's biggest cinema and streaming titles reviewed, plus recommendations, Trailer Club and more
Happy 2025!
Hope you’ve recovered from the end-of-year celebrations. After all, you’re going to need to be match-fit to keep up with all the new-slash-delayed movies coming out this year. Luckily. The Movie Wingman has your back as ever; look out for our curated 2025 preview next week. In the meantime, with it being Friday (checks calendar just to be doubly sure), we’ve got a batch of new reviews for you, including major awards prospects Nickel Boys and A Real Pain. There’s also Asif Kapadia’s docu-drama 2073 (already a frontrunner for bleakest movie of the year).
Gifting season is over, but you can still treat yourself or a movie-loving pal to a Wingman subscription. Packages start from just a fiver a month, and you’ll get access to bonus writings every week including interviews, think pieces and more. (FYI this edition is entirely free, but our paywall strikes back next week.)
Feel free to leave us a comment or a like; we’d love to hear all your movie-related thoughts. And we’ll be back on Tuesday with our own musings on the movies to come over the next 12 months. Buckle up…
Matthew (Matt and Jordan)
Reviews
Nickel Boys
12A, in cinemas now
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Adapted from Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about historic cruelty and abuse at a Florida reform school, Nickel Boys is the most formally daring film of the last 12 months. Captured in confrontational and intimate first person and with a narrative untethered in time, the cumulative effect of its unusual filmmaking choices is akin to experiencing the memories of a life that aren’t your own.
Two lives, to be exact – those of Elwood (Ethan Herisse) and Turner (Brandon Wilson). Both are literal point-of-view characters, though initially we see the world through the eyes of Elwood – an academically gifted young man who is sent to Nickel Academy in the mid-1960s following an unjust run-in with the law. Segregated along racial lines, the Black students are told they are ‘grubs’, spend most of their days slavishly working the land, and can expect barbaric punishments to be meted out by the institution’s corrupt administrator (Hamish Linklater) should they step out of line.
It’s at Nickel that Elwood meets Turner. Denied access to his grandmother (Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor), Elwood comes to rely on Turner’s friendship for survival in an inhumane environment, while the orphaned Turner sees in Elwood the potential for family. In parallel, the film flashes forward to an older Elwood in the 2010s, when an investigation into the now-defunct academy has exposed the horrors that once unfolded there.
Directed and co-written by RaMell Ross, a photographer-turned-filmmaker who previously helmed the impressionistic 2018 doc Hale County This Morning, This Evening, Nickel Boys feels like the herald of a major new voice in American cinema. In the hands of almost any other filmmaker, Whitehead’s novel would make for a fine, traditionally rendered drama. But Ross’ thrilling experimentation – never gimmicky, and always in service of story – is a rare but meaningful step forward for the grammar of cinema after decades of stagnation.
It’s not just the actors looking down the barrel of the lens, or the use of SnorriCams (rigs fixed to the actors, so they remain static in the frame as the world around them moves), or the documentary-like deployment of stock footage to locate us in an era, or the wandering lens that tends to focus on Malick-ian minutiae in a very human way, or the striking use of time-lapse footage to convey a lengthy journey – every technical decision made complements and enriches the story’s emotional core.
For some, the film’s grab bag of tricks will be distancing; there is no question that the first-person perspective creates a certain artificiality, perversely feeling less naturalistic than a trad over-the-shoulder shot might. And it isn’t until the film’s final moments that the purpose of some key techniques – particularly the choice to fix the camera a foot or so behind Elwood’s head for the entirety of the 2010s scenes – snaps into focus. But this is profound storytelling by a filmmaker at the vanguard. (Jordan Farley)
In short: Bravura technical execution married to a gut-punch story with a shocking basis in reality.
Stay for the credits? Only to luxuriate in more of Scott Alario, Forest Kelley and Alex Somers’ stirring score, and to get a second glimpse at Orion’s funky new cosmic logo.
Further reading: If you’ve never seen it, or your interest is piqued by the clips that feature in Nickel Boys, Stanley Kramer classic The Defiant Ones is screening at the BFI Southbank on the 5th and 19th of January.
A Real Pain
15, in cinemas 8 January
⭐⭐⭐⭐☆
The Holocaust continues to fascinate filmmakers, and A Real Pain offers a refreshing perspective on the subject. In his second feature as writer/director, Jesse Eisenberg also co-stars as David, who takes a trip with his cousin Benji (Kieran Culkin) to explore Jewish history in Poland, and visit their recently deceased grandmother’s childhood home. Probably best categorised under the clumsy ‘dramedy’ umbrella, this buddy travelogue is often sharply funny as it wrestles with the contradictions of well-to-do Americans exploring horrendous historical suffering in first-class comfort, and these tensions are easily teased out by the chalk-and-cheese pairing of respectful milquetoast David and unfiltered wild card Benji. Eisenberg’s direction is clean and unfussy, heroing the screenplay’s dialogue exchanges and giving Culkin a golden post-Succession role that’s put him among the Supporting Actor frontrunners this season. But enjoyable as the odd-couple antics can be, Eisenberg slowly and steadily teases out an impactful dramatic dimension in the cousins’ relationship. In a tidy 90 minutes, you get laughter, emotion, some catharsis and enough ambiguity to ensure plenty of post-film conversation. (Matt Maytum)
2073
15, in cinemas now; digital 6 January
⭐⭐☆☆☆
Anyone suffering the January blues may want to avoid the latest from Asif Kapadia, a doom-laden docu-drama that issues a warning from the FUBAR-ed future. It’s the year 2073: surveillance drones fill the smoggy skies, while beneath an abandoned shopping mall we find shell-shocked survivor Ghost, played by Samantha Morton. “My life’s turned into one of those sci-fi comics I used to read,” she laments in voiceover. How did things get to this point? Cue a torrent of present-day news footage of dictators, unchecked big-tech bros, police brutality, extreme weather events and Nigel Farage. Commentators (notably journalist Maria Ressa) offer gobbets of context, while Naomi Ackie (as the only other fictional character of note) turns up too late in the day to make much impact. It’s all rather scattershot and soundbite-y and might have worked better as a straight doco in the vein of Kapadia’s more rigorous bio-portraits Senna, Diego Maradona and the Oscar-winning Amy. At least 2073 doesn’t patronise viewers with glib solutions or messages of hope; the sole relief to be found in this unrelenting howl of despair is that it’s only 83 minutes long. (Matthew Leyland)
Wingman Recommends
Spirited Away
(Out now, cinemas)
Unless we’re counting Battle of the Planets (is the Russo Bros adap still happening?), my anime gateway was the original release of Miyazaki’s 2001 masterpiece (which didn’t reach the UK until ‘03). On first viewing I was baffled and beguiled; two decades on, I’m still a little bit of the former, but mostly the latter. And I’m still convinced every single time that Chihiro’s parents are going to remain as pigs forever, such is the power (and at times terror) of Miyazaki’s storytelling. Yes, the film’s been on Netflix for yonks, but if you want to escape fully down the rabbit hole, catch this cinema rerelease. (ML)
The Night Before Christmas in Wonderland
(Out now, Sky Cinema/NOW)
OK, so it’s a bit late to be suggesting Christmas movies, I know (the genre is dead to me from 26 December until the next advent calendar begins), but in case you’ve got kids to entertain for the final stretch of the holidays, I heartily recommend this Crimbo/Carroll hybrid. It’s an appealing blend of 2D animation, great songs (by Guy Chambers), and likeable voice cast, including Gerard Butler at his cuddliest as St. Nick and Emilia Clarke having a riot as the unfestive Queen of Hearts. (I lost it when Tom Allen turned up as ‘Fish Barrister’.) (MM)
The Traitors S3
(Airing now on BBC One/iPlayer)
Reality TV may be somewhat outside The Movie Wingman’s remit, but Matt, Matthew and I are all obsessively watching the latest series of The Traitors on BBC One, following its return on Wednesday – and you should too. Never seen it? In short, it’s a social deception game where 19 faithful players must root out the three ‘traitors’ hidden in their midst before they’re murdered – betrayal, amateur sleuthing and tearful hysterics ensue. You can jump straight in with series three, but the first two series were some of the best TV of their respective years, so it’s well worth devouring it all. For movie fans there’s a fun meta game to play as well – spot the covers of film scores. Already this series I’m sure I’ve detected a snippet of Ludwig Göransson’s Oppenheimer score in episode 1, and Lux Aeterna, from Clint Mansell’s Requiem for a Dream score, features during a prominent moment in episode 2. Someone in the music department is clearly a film fan… (JF)
Trailer Club
It was always going to be slim pickings during Twixmas, so thanks are due to Netflix for dropping this tense first look at upcoming limited series Zero Day. Robert De Niro stars as a former president dealing with the fallout of a massive cyberattack that has left thousands dead. Given how outspoken Bobby D is in real life, the idea of him playing a former POTUS is an intriguing one, and the cast is also populated by the extremely reliable likes of Jesse Plemons, Lizzy Caplan and Angela Bassett. That’s worth adding to your list, surely? (MM)
On the Wingman office stereo…
Family car journeys have meant repeat listens of the Mufasa: The Lion King soundtrack (at the younglings’ behest). Catchy stuff, and this is one to file under ‘Is there anything Mads Mikkelsen can’t do?’
Thanks for some great recommendations once again! I went to see Nosferatu this week. It was certainly dreamy, mesmerising and incredibly cinematic with amazing sound and score (in fact I almost fell asleep a couple of times 😆) but I did come away thinking what was the point? Do we really need another Dracula story?