Sinners (2025)

I've never seen Creed or any of its sequels so I mainly know Ryan Coogler from Black Panther and its follow-up.  Marvel films, with their cookie-cutter plots, bland film style and awkwardly forced politics are never a way to judge a director.  In fact, if anything, all the major franchises have been pretty much career killers for directors.  They either have the film taken out of their hands and something completely different presented - for which they get the blame - or the bland, no-risk process washes out whatever creativity they ever had.

Many directors have actors they like to work with and, in this case, it's Michael B. Jordan.  He played Killmonger in the first Black Panther, becoming one of the few memorable villains of the franchise, and is himself a creative force in acting, music and activism.  It's good to have someone like Jordan to lean on when trying to break away from what I am sure feels like an assembly line style of film production.  It also helps to have all that money one gets when being successful at it as well.

Sammie (Miles Caton) is the son of a local pastor (Saul Williams) in rural Mississippi.  He is also the younger cousin of brothers Smoke and Stack (Jordan), also known as the Smokestack Twins.  They have just returned to town from Chicago with a bag full of money and dreams of opening up a local juke joint.  Enlisting Sammie to supply the music along with pianist Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo) as well some help from local grocers Bo (Yao) and Grace Chow (Li Jun Li) they set out to do just that, buying an old mill from the local sheriff.

There are unforeseen complications.  Mary (Hailee Steinfeld), a former lover of Smoke that passes as white, is in town for her mother's funeral.  Stack also has a reunion with a Annie (Wunmi Mosaku), a magic practitioner and cook that he had a daughter with.  Sammie himself becomes enamored of a married woman named Pearline (Jayme Lawson).  However, it's the uninvited guests, led by a strange musician named Remmick (Jack O'Connell) that are a major concern, as he is definitely more than he seems to be. 

Sinners bears some similarities to From Dusk Till Dawn in the same way that it switches genres for about the last half.  Coogler has admitted that he was influenced by that film as well as others, but what it is in many ways is a celebration of music.  Not just blues music, although the ancestral connections to Africa in the blues are a significant part of the film's background, but all music and the ability of musicians to transport their audience.  In this case Sammie has some unique qualities that go beyond just performance, and those qualities catch the eye of Remmick.  He is an interesting villain and I think that Coogler gives him just enough back story to make him interesting.  Where I think a mistake is made is that we don't spend more time getting to know him.  It seems there is a lot more nuance to Remmick than we are shown, particularly as the creatures that Coogler has conjured, despite following many of the traditions of their kind, have a few other interesting traits such as shared memories.  

The story does take place mainly in Mississippi in the 1930s so segregation and racism figure heavily in the background, although not as much as one might think.  Sinners is a weird mix of period drama, character study, horror film and blaxploitation-style fantasy.  When the Klan do show up they are dealt with in a way that would make any exploitation director of the '70s proud.  In a strange way, the life of the villains is made attractive as well, although Annie is quite clear about her preferences and what one gives up. 

I have few complaints with the film.  I think the build-up is important as is the wrap-up, although the horror portion gets to be a bit rushed.  There is some dodgy CGI here and there, mainly toward the beginning with a rattlesnake and some train smoke that looks pixilated.  Coogler did something rare these days and make the movie on actual film which does give it a more classic look.  

What he does show here is that he has what it takes to become one of the more individual and creative voices in Hollywood.  I believe one thing he has learned is something that a lot of black directors from the '70s knew and that is there is no need to compromise to a white audience when making your film.  I'm sure there is a lot I missed in the movie that would have deeper meaning if I was black, but I feel the same way watching foreign films as well.  I prefer getting a window into someone's culture rather than being presented a watered-down version for my own palate.  I look forward to whatever he has in store next as long as it is his own. 

Sinners (2025)

Time: 137 minutes

Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Miles Caton, Delroy Lindo, Jack O'Connell

Director: Ryan Coogler