Review: SINNERS

 by Rob DiCristino

“You keep dancing with the devil, and one day he’s gonna follow you home.”

It’s a gorgeous Mississippi day in the autumn of 1932, and there’s going to be a party tonight. The Smokestack twins (Michael B. Jordan as Smoke and his brother, Stack) have finally come home after tours of duty in the Great War and almost a decade in the employ of Chicago gangster Al Capone. With pockets full of dirty money and crates full of Irish beer, the twins have taken the Delta by storm, assembling a team of rabble-rousers disreputable enough to make the grand opening of their new juke joint — built from the bones of a derelict sawmill they’ve just purchased from a local Klansman (David Maldonado) — one for the history books. Smoke’s old flame Annie (Wunmi Mosaku) will handle the fish fry, while local entrepreneurs like the Chow family (specifically Li Jun Li as Grace) will arrange signage, service, and other amenities. Gentle giant sharecropper Cornbread (Omar Miller) will run the door, while Delta Slim (the legendary Delroy Lindo) — a thoroughly pickled bluesman who agrees to work for his weight in beer — will provide the evening’s entertainment.

That’s all more than enough for a great Saturday night, but it’s the Smokestack’s little cousin Sammie “Preacher Boy” Moore (Miles Canton, earning his special “Introducing” credit), who will make it epic. Sammie has a gift, you see, a power that mystics like Annie believe can break the boundaries of space and time. With his steel guitar and soulful voice, Sammie can conjure spirits from the past and future, spirits of ancestors and descendents alike. Though separated by eras (eras) and cultures, these spirits are united in the truth of Sammie’s music, and it’s this unity that will turn the twins’ homecoming into something more than just a party: It’ll be a celebration of their triumphs over fascism in Europe and bigotry under Jim Crow. It’ll be an affirmation of the bond that kept them together after their parents’ deaths, a tragedy that made Mary (Hailee Steinfeld, who, like her character, is a quarter Black but passing) more than just Stack’s jilted lover. But the spirits Sammie conjures don’t just come from above. No, he’s awakened something in the darkness, as well.

So begins Ryan Coogler’s sweat-soaked, blood-splattered Sinners, a rousing cocktail of horror, music, history, and mysticism that not only marks the writer/director’s return from the Marvel ecosystem — the less said about Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the better — but represents the best work of his career so far. Though he’s done it with a style and pathos well beyond the usual franchise fare, Coogler has still been building in other people’s sandboxes for the decade-plus since Fruitvale Station, and Sinners plays out like a primal scream of relief, a full-throated original symphony from a composer often hampered by the limitations of corporate filmmaking. This is Coogler’s blank check, to use the parlance of our times, and he’s spending every cent of it. Shot on astonishing 65mm film — with one particular aspect ratio change so ostentatious you’ll want to stand up and cheer — and anchored by Ludwig Göransson’s stunning score, Sinners is the first 2025 blockbuster that demands to be seen in a theater. And if I’m saying that, you know it must be true.

That’s high praise, for sure, but after churning out a string of billion-dollar blockbusters, it’s also clear that Coogler is no longer content to rest on his talent for aesthetics and worldbuilding. Nor is he interested in simply repeating the beats of horror forebears like From Dusk Till Dawn, The Thing, and Demon Knight, all of which are noted inspirations here. In fact, Sinners isn’t even all that frightening — its best gag is actually a trick of editing that doubles as an ingenious bit of storytelling — and reaches only for the handful of scares it knows it can pull off effectively. Whether that’s Coogler acknowledging that half-hearted concessions to genre tropes rob his work of the voice that makes it so singular — see the final action sequence in the original Black Panther — or it’s simply an element of the film that got squeezed out is hard to say. Regardless, Sinners’ textured characters and engaging drama will mitigate the concerns of those coming to it for goop and gore. There will be blood, in other words, but you’ll care much more about the people spilling it.

Which brings us to longtime Coogler muse Michael B. Jordan, who also turns in career-best work in Sinners. Though always a charismatic screen presence, Jordan has sometimes struggled with authenticity. His performances have a tendency to feel practiced and mannered, something that works when he’s playing strivers like Erik Killmonger or Adonis Creed but can sting a bit in other roles. As Smoke and Stack, however, Jordan looks comfortable and confident, distinguishing each brother with broad character interpretations — Smoke, older by minutes, carries the weight of responsibility while Stack plays the charming wild card — and incredible nuances in inflection and posture. Coogler’s cast is uniformly excellent, of course, but this is Jordan’s show, and from the moment the twins swagger into town flashing their identical — but again, somehow distinct — smiles, Sinners lights a fuse that never burns out. As with Coogler, it’s a true relief to see Jordan not only live up to the promise of his early work but smash any remaining reservations to pieces.

Some may find Sinners a bit unwieldy as it races toward an ending more preoccupied with closing its thematic arcs than with fleshing out its vampire lore, but Coogler justifies these shifts far better here than he has in the past. Though our lead bloodsuckers (Jack O’Connell, Peter Dreimanis, and Lola Kirk) are well-drawn and their visages are just spooky enough to pass muster, Coogler would rather we focus on the offer they’re making to characters whose besiegement is both literal and sociological: We’re all friends in death, they say, regardless of color, race, or creed. Only through their fellowship can our heroes find the acceptance and respect that the American South has denied them. But even with that said, Coogler is wise enough not to couch his entire drama in the more obvious injustices; each one of our heroes has long-since learned to flourish despite the racism and bigotry of their time. This isn’t about victimization — it’s about propriety. It’s about keeping what we’ve earned. It’s about our inalienable, god-given right not merely to survive, but to thrive.

But even if none of that comes together for you, Sinners would remain an exceptional piece of genre filmmaking, a three-star premise elevated to four-star glory on the backs of outstanding performances — further including Jayme Lawson as Pearline, a beautiful singer who makes mincemeat out of Sammie’s budding sexuality — and expert construction. Ruth E. Carter’s costuming is predictably immaculate, and compositions by cinematographer Autumn Durland Arkapaw (Wakanda Forever) alternate between elegant, intimate, and sprawling, sometimes in the same extended one-take tracking shots that also showcase production designer Hannah Bleacher’s remarkable set work. In short, Sinners is as good an argument for cinema as any I’ve seen since COVID, a raucous, luscious, and sensationally horny capital-M Movie that never succumbs to easy sentiment, cheap thrills, or misguided self-importance. Though played out through his twins, this is truly Ryan Coogler’s homecoming, his elevation from box-office powerhouse to fully-formed auteur.

Sinners hits U.S. theaters on Friday, April 18th.