Elwood Curtis’s college dream shatters alongside a two-lane Florida highway. Bearing the brunt of an innocent misstep, he’s sentenced to the netherworld of Nickel Academy, a brutal reformatory sunk deep in the Jim Crow South. There, he encounters another ward, the seen-it-all Turner. The two Black teens strike up an alliance: Turner dispenses fundamental tips for survival, and Elwood clings to his optimistic worldview. Backdropped by the burgeoning civil rights movement, Elwood and Turner’s existence appears worlds away from Rev. Martin Luther King’s burnished oratory. Despite Nickel’s brutality, Elwood strives to hold onto his humanity, awakening a new vision for Turner.