Sinners

Ryan Coogler opens his 2025 film Sinners with the imagery of his heritage, things that can be seen as stereotypically black in American history. The first is music, with a brief narration describing those who were blessed with the gift of song. Then we see religion with the chapel and the preacher. This one is punctuated with the arrival of Samuel “Sammie” Moore (Miles Canton), obviously injured and clutching the remains of a guitar. Here we also get some brief flashes to the horrors that are coming later in the film. Finally, we get the cotton fields and the sharecroppers out there picking the crop. These are not slaves—it’s far too recent in history for that—but it still evokes those times in our past. This is a film that tackles racism in the South and, but for those quick flashes at the church, we might be watching yet another film about just that.  

But this is Ryan Coogler and he isn’t going to give us just another movie about race relations south of the Mason-Dixon line. He’s going to bury that messaging behind a plot that is reminiscent of another great filmmaker duo, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, in their 1996 cult classic From Dusk Till Dawn but put his own spin on it. The final result is a fascinating look at race relations, black musical history, and vampires. The last one would have been a surprise to any moviegoers at the time had it not been heavily spoiled in the trailers for months leading up to the film’s release. 

On January 22, 2026, Sinners broke Academy Award records by becoming the most nominated film in Oscars history with 16 total nominations. The previous record was held by All About Eve, La La Land, and Titanic, each tied with 14 nominations. Even factoring out the new category of Best Cast, it still would have the most nominations for a single film. Still, despite all this Oscar praise, it is not considered the frontrunner for Best Picture. Of course, only time will tell and perhaps Sinners has the legs it will need to take the win. 

Sinners opens in 1932 with identical twin brothers Elijah “Smoke” and Elias “Stack” Moore (Michael B. Jordan). The twins are returning home to Clarksdale, Mississippi, after spending time in World War I and then seven years in Chicago working for Capone. They return with crates full of beer and wine and money they stole from the crime syndicates, which they use to purchase an old sawmill with the intent to start a juke joint for the local black community. Their younger cousin Sammie (newcomer Miles Caton) joins them despite facing criticism and warnings from his pastor father, Jedidiah (Saul Williams), about the evils of blues music. 

The brothers also recruit pianist Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo) to bring his music to the juke; Annie (Wunmi Mosaku), Smoke’s wife, to cook; Cornbread (Omar Benson Miller) to be the bouncer; and a local Chinese shopkeeping couple, Grace (Li Jun Li) and Bo Chow (Yao), as the suppliers. Annie’s relationship with her husband, Smoke, is strained after the death of their infant child, despite her beliefs in Hoodoo that she believes should have kept the child safe. Even though Smoke no longer believes in the Hoodoo because of the loss of their child, he still wears the charm Annie gave him to keep him safe in the war. The couple also still have a raw physical need for each other that hasn’t abated with their time apart.

Elsewhere, a strange man, smoking in the open sun and being pursued by Choctaw Indians, takes shelter at the residence of a married Klansman couple. As the sun sets, this man, an Irish immigrant vampire named Remmick (Jack O’Connell), turns this couple into vampires, too. This trio of bloodsuckers shows up at the newly opened juke, looking for Sammie, whose music has drawn them to the place, and wanting to be invited in. But a combination of things, including but not limited to their skin color, convinces Smoke and Stack to refuse them entry, despite their offer of money which the brothers are in serious need of now that their cash is tied up in the new business. 

Had you not seen any of the advertisements and trailers going into Sinners, you might be forgiven if you assumed this was a straightforward drama about music and racial relations. However, even though the film takes a significant amount of time getting to the horror aspect of the story, Ryan Coogler does tease it in the opening scene. Sammie, cut and bleeding, arrives at his father’s church clutching the broken neck of a guitar. This is the one false note of the film, the one moment where Coogler can’t resist showing his hand. We get a few brief flashbacks to the blood and gore that will make up the finale of the film, jump scares that tell you right away where this film is heading. It would have been a stronger film had Coogler trusted his audience to stay with him without these flashes of gore. Without these flashes, this film would feel like a Prohibition-era gangster movie, right up until Remmick enters the picture. Coogler is clearly inspired by From Dusk Till Dawn and that film doesn’t bother teasing where the ending is going, trusting the audience to be along for the ride, even if they are not aware of where that ride is heading. 

While Sinners does eventually conform to genre conventions, it does so in a way that is uniquely Ryan Coogler. This is the director of Black Panther after all, and he has brought with him the ever-reliable Michael B. Jordan, arguably the best part of that picture. We could have also seen Chadwick Boseman in a part similar to the one occupied by Miles Caton—he played just such a role in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom—but the actor tragically passed away before such a thing could have happened. That being said, Miles Caton, who was a backup singer for H.E.R. and had no prior acting credits, is amazing in this picture and brings some incredible charisma and vocal chops to the screen. This is an impressive debut and we can hope he continues to act. It’s a rare gift to be this good at acting and singing and he can do both well.

The racism on display is exactly what we can expect to see in Mississippi from the 1930s. Having lived there myself in the 1990s, I can testify that it still exists to a degree. The man the twins buy the sawmill from may laugh at their mentioning of the Klan, insisting that it no longer exists, but we see behind that laugh that he knows otherwise and is, indeed, a member of that hate group. The juke is strictly going to be black people only, with the lone exception being Stack’s white girlfriend Mary (Hailee Steinfeld), who claims her father is half-black. She gets a pass for being “family” but is the only white person—partially white, that is—allowed inside. Not all of the racism is obvious, too. Some of it requires you to pay attention to things. We see Grace working in a retail store, away from her husband and daughter. Coogler gives us a long shot of the daughter walking from their store to the one Grace is in, then Grace walking back. Grace works in the store the white people can shop at while her husband owns the shop the black people can shop at. This isn’t spelled out, exactly, but it is there if you’re paying attention.

Coogler falls back on old vampire mythos such as them needing to be invited in before they can come inside. By doing so, he is also taking a stab at racial tensions and the realities of the times. It works both ways and is a convenient bit of mythos for the themes that Coogler is working with. It is telling, too, that the one who first breeches that defense is the white woman in the midst. Later, when all hell breaks loose, it is brought upon by Grace, who, in defiance and a determination to protect someone she loves, shouts out “Come on in,” allowing a full-on assault. 

The film opens with a voice-over from Annie: “There are legends of people…born with the gift of making music so true, it can pierce the veil between life and death. Conjuring spirits from the past…the future. In ancient Ireland, they were called Fili. In Choctaw land, they called them Firekeepers. And in West Africa, they’re called griots. This gift can bring healing to their communities, but it also attracts evil.” The title of the film is Sinners, and we see a lot of that going around during the opening night of the juke joint; lots of drinking and sex. It also transcends time as envisioned by a superb and surreal sequence where we see Sammie playing and singing while all around the juke, musicians and musical styles from the past, present, and future dance and play around them all, culminating with the whole sawmill disintegrating around them all in a ball of fire. The music brings that with it, of course, but it also brings with it a deeper evil, one that is attracted to the power and the history. 

Once the vampire attacks begin, the film does lose a little of its identity, blurred by genre clichés. It becomes an entirely different movie, a part of the first half but also separate. Coogler doesn’t lose his flair for storytelling, but we lose some of the steam the first half built up. Still, there is so much gore and energy that it helps carry this film over this hurdle and keep us from completely checking out. And when it’s all over, we get a nice little scene that takes place many years later that wraps up the story and the themes quite nicely.  Still, there is the feeling that this could have been an interesting movie on its own without the supernatural element. But then it probably wouldn’t have been as successful at the box office had it gone that route. 

While this movie isn’t the most subtle film tackling racism and the white man taking what they want from the black, it is among the most unique, and it is immensely entertaining to boot. While it now holds the record for the most Academy Award nominations of any single film, it isn’t favored to break the record for wins nor is it the frontrunner for Best Picture. Only time will tell, though, whether it can come from behind in the polls and defy the odds. While it’s not my favorite film on the nomination list for this year, I wouldn’t be upset if it pulls it off. 

Academy Award Nominations:

Best Picture: Zinzi Coogler, Sev Ohanian, and Ryan Coogler

Best Director: Ryan Coogler

Best Actor: Michael B. Jordan

Best Supporting Actor: Delroy Lindo

Best Supporting Actress: Wunmi Mosaku

Best Original Screenplay: Ryan Coogler

Best Casting: Francine Maisler

Best Cinematography: Autumn Durald Arkapaw

Best Film Editing: Michael P. Shawver

Best Costume Design: Ruth E. Carter

Best Makeup and Hairstyling: Ken Diaz, Mike Fontaine, and Shunika Terry

Best Original Score: Ludwig Göransson

Best Original Song: “ I Lied to You” by Raphael Saadiq and Ludwig Göransson

Best Production Design: Hannah Beachler and Monique Champagne

Best Sound: Chris Welcker, Benjamin A. Burtt, Felipe Pacheco, Brandon Proctor, and Steve Boeddeker

Best Visual Effects: Michael Ralla, Espen Nordahl, Guido Wolter, and Donnie Dean

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Release Date: April 18, 2025

Running Time: 138 minutes

Rated R

Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Miles Caton, Jack O’Connell, Wunmi Mosaku, Jayme Lawson, Omar Miller, and Delroy Lindo

Directed by: Ryan Coogler