Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series spotlighting the scripts behind awards season’s buzziest film continues with Nickel Boys, the feature directing debut of Oscar-nominated Hale County This Morning, This Evening filmmaker RaMell Ross, who with longtime collaborator Joslyn Barnes adapted Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer-wining 2019 novel.

Orion Pictures and Amazon MGM Studios debuted the film at the Telluride Film Festival at the end of summer and its has been racking up awards recognition ever since, including Best Picture nominations from the Golden Globes, Critics Choice Awards, Independent Spirit Awards and the Gotham Awards, where Ross won Best Director and co-star Brandon Wilson won Breakthrough Performer.

Ross and Barnes’ adapted screenplay has also been nominated for several honors especially among critics groups this season, as has Jomo Fray’s cinematography, which has drawn raves for its use of an unconventional Pov that, according to Ross, is designed to make the viewer a character.