‘Sinners’ offers excellent performances and compelling themes, even if it bites off more than it can chew

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — MILD SPOILERS AHEAD for Sinners, if you haven’t seen any trailers or marketing for this movie. Those who don’t know anything about Sinners shouldn’t read any further, but if you know anything about this one, none of what you read will be a surprise.

Synopsis

Taking place in Mississippi during the Jim Crow era, Sinners follows African American twin brothers Smoke (Michael B. Jordan) and Stack (Michael B. Jordan) after they return to their hometown. Trying to leave their life of crime behind, the brothers open up a nightclub where black people will be able to freely express themselves, but an evil hatred descends upon them on their opening night: the vampiric kind.

My thoughts

Ryan Coogler is pretty much living the dream as far as directors are concerned. His first film, Fruitvale Station, won the Best First Film award at Cannes, and then he went on to reinvigorate the Rocky series with Creed, followed by giving Marvel some of their biggest critical and commercial hits with the Black Panther films. With just 5 films in 12 years, he’s been able to build up a clout to make the filmmaking world his oyster.

Not being based on a true story, prior franchise, comic book, or anything like that, Sinners is Coogler’s first wholly original film. Even then, I would struggle to call it wholly original as it’s heavily inspired by From Dusk Till Dawn, unfortunately to a slight fault. That’s where my whole spoiler warning at the top comes from because Coogler basically implements the same format that Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino did for their film, with all the vampire stuff being in the second half.

Slay the blues

As much as I try to not know what a movie’s about before walking into the theater, I always still end up finding out what they’re about in some way. Therefore, I knew about the vampires and which major characters would become vampires in Sinners, which makes the suspense and surprises fall kind of flat. The build up to it all is solid, though, with Coogler vividly dropping us into this setting and large cast of characters with their detailed and intertwining backstories.

Even if the story structure resembles From Dusk Till Dawn too much, Coogler does explore his own story and themes that make Sinners stand out and worthwhile. This isn’t really a movie about vampires or criminal brothers, but about blues music and what it means to African American culture. If you love classical blues, there’s plenty of it to be found here, with numerous lengthy sequences of people playing and singing from the soul.

One of Coogler’s hallmarks is his examination of the racial prejudice black Americans experienced in the past and still experience to this day. It’s one of the things that made Black Panther stand out from other Marvel movies: it was genuinely about something with its social commentary. Sure, it ended up descending into CGI noise at the end, but that honest intent to explore subjects most comic book films wouldn’t dare touch was a noble effort.

There’s a stunning long-take tracking shot that basically sums up Coogler’s entire point he’s trying to make with Sinners. It takes us through the nightclub as blues guitar prodigy Sammie Moore (Miles Caton) performs in front of a crowd singing, dancing, and having the time of their lives. It quickly becomes surreal as we then see a man in traditional African clothing playing an early version of the guitar followed by a Jimi Hendrix lookalike shredding away on an electric.

The scene continues on with black people across various generations partying together in the club, showing how the music they created thousands of years ago has evolved and lived on through millennia. It also shows how their music influences popular music to this day, but back then, they had to keep it to themselves. In those times, playing music like this allowed them to be free to express their pain before it was eventually co-opted and commodified.

The vampires in Sinners don’t just want to cause chaos and suck some blood, but their goal has deeper social meaning, especially in regard to the time period it takes place. They want Sammie for his musical talent, providing an intriguing allegory into how white people culturally appropriated the blues from black people. This social commentary is definitely very heavy-handed, but Coogler has never exactly been subtle, and I appreciate him giving a vampire movie some thematic meaning.

Slightly out of tune

Sinners runs nearly two and a half hours and Coogler incorporates a lot into the narrative. It’s all interesting, but it feels overstuffed and with too many characters and resolutions, as interesting as some of them were. I respect Coogler’s commitment to his premise and thematic ideas, but I felt he committed too much to the point where some aspects were distracting.

Look, I love blues music. Some of my favorite guitarists were inspired by the blues, and I respect its history and culture. However, I don’t think it makes for effective movie music, especially when you’re scoring a drama film that turns into a horror flick. Frequent Coogler collaborator Ludwig Göransson composed the score and it’s certainly different than his usual electronic and orchestral fare. He goes for a full blues-inspired score here, which you think would fit the movie’s themes and vibe.

Sinners is a horror movie because it has horror movie stuff like vampires, but it was never all that scary because the atmosphere often felt off. You can have the most compelling character drama or intense horror scene ever, but if you have someone constantly noodling away on a guitar in the background, I’ll be taken out of the movie every time. The use of blues music as the score is one of those creative decisions I completely understand, but one I don’t necessarily agree with.

The commitment to turning this into bloody vampire schlock in the second half also made the film feel tonally at odds with itself. Unlike From Dusk Till Dawn and Django Unchained, which play the events in a fun and cheeky manner throughout, Sinners is only over the top during the vampire scenes. The gore and vampire flying effects are pretty cheesy (perhaps intentionally so?), which makes seeing extreme content like this even more jarring in a movie with such serious subject matter.

One trait from the Marvel Cinematic Universe that seems to have rubbed off on Coogler is his heavy use of comic relief. It’s just another one of those aspects that didn’t ruin the movie for me but distracted me from the gravity of the situation. It’s when the characters are taking everything seriously and operating on pure fear and emotion that the action really works.

It turns out the “B.” in Michael B. Jordan stands for “Both”, as he plays twin brothers here. There sure have been a lot of movies where one actor portrays two different characters lately, and Jordan can now be added to the list with his forceful turns as Smoke and Stack. He plays them both just differently enough that you can tell them apart but still believe they’re brothers from their (his?) chemistry.

As I mentioned above, this has a large cast of characters, but Coogler’s ample time developing them all during the first half paid off. They’re perfectly cast, too, featuring some greats like Hailee Steinfeld, Wunmi Mosaku, Delroy Lindo, and Jack O’Connell. With these actors and Coogler’s writing, each character is well-developed and has depth, even if they might not have that much screen time.

Final verdict

Sinners gives audiences a unique twist on the vampire genre, but if it was just a vampire horror film, it wouldn’t have been anything special. Coogler’s signature exploration into the racial experiences of black people in America is what makes his movies what they are, and this one is no exception. It’s a passionate and somber love letter to the blues and the black people who created it, who influenced it, and who are still influenced by it today.

I will say, Sinners is good enough for me to want to see it in IMAX 70mm, as my screening was sadly a standard presentation. Still, there was an air of clunkiness hovering above that kept me from loving it. The tone is inconsistent, the editing is odd, the comic dialogue was a bit much, and the musical choices simply didn’t work for me at all. Thematically and character-wise, though, this is terrific and will no doubt resonate with me for years to come. Beyond making entertaining movies, I think that’s Coogler’s goal as a filmmaker above all.