‘Nickel Boys,’ ‘Presence’ and the first-person POV movie

“Who tells the story?” is the central question in the Oscar-nominated “Nickel Boys,” as well as director Steven Soderbergh’s latest cinematic experiment, “Presence.”

A Best Picture nominee at this year’s Academy Awards, “Nickel Boys” tells the story of two African-American teenagers enrolled in an oppressive reform school in the 1960s. Director/co-writer RaMell Ross, collaborating with cinematographer Jomo Fray, shoot the entire film in a first-person point of view, beginning with Elwood’s (Ethan Herisse) journey to the Nickel Academy reform school after he is wrongfully convicted of stealing a car.