I’ve heard and read the reviews of Sinners. I was expecting a horror film. What I got was a soul-wrenching miracle that was impossibly transferred to film.
Sinners
Now, I’m going to review this film not as a critic but as the psychic/medium/ old soul that I am. Because children…there is a lot of history and culture wrapped in beautiful sights and sounds, and for you new souls…you might miss this miracle unfolding on the screen. And, let me add this up front: the only way to properly watch this film…is on the big screen.
Sinners is a Southern Gothic horror story written and directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B. Jordan, Miles Caton, Saul Williams, Jack O’Connell, Wunmi Mosaku, Hailee Steinfeld, Jayme Lawson, Delroy Lindo, Li Jun Li, Yao, and Dave Maldonado.
Yes, there are vampires, but they come in towards the middle of the story after we are introduced to brothers Smoke and Stack (Michael B. Jordan), who, after serving their country in World War 1, settled in Chicago to work for the famous gangster, Al Capone. You can tell the brothers apart because of their hats. They’ve returned to Clarksdale, Mississippi, with cash, weapons, and Irish beer.
They want to open a juke joint in a place and time where the KKK is powerful, and where cotton is still harvested by the sweat and tears of good people. They enlist their younger cousin Sammie (Miles Caton). Sammie has inherited the guitar of Smoke and Stack’s father. Now Sammie can play that guitar, and he can sing so powerfully that his minister daddy is frightened for the boy’s soul. Some music…the music that comes from deep down in the soul…due to suffering and grief…yes, that kind of music. That music has a way of tearing into the fabric of space and time. Smoke and Stack also hire musician, Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo), along with Annie (Wunmi Mosaku), a voodoo priestess who bore a child with Smoke, and Asian grocers Grace (Li Jun Li) and Bo Chow (Yao). After buying the building from the KKK leader (Dave Maldonado), the twins get everything ready for opening night, unaware of the evil coming their way.
This is a sensual film. Smoke loves Annie, and they both mourn the infant who died. Stack is in love with Mary (Hailee Steinfeld), a white woman, but hateful people forbade this love back in those days. Even Sammie is able to find love with Pearline (Jayme Lawson), although forbidden because she is married.
Remmick
Now, I’ve seen my share of vampire films, starting with Bela Lugosi at our neighbourhood theatre, with paper bags stuffed with four baloney sandwiches for my siblings and me to eat as we spent our Saturday afternoons watching the Creature Double Feature horror films. Jack O’Connell’s Remmick sideswipes us from the moment he arrives on the scene. We, at first, see a charming but frantic Irish man seeking sanctuary. But he is a storyteller with a mission. By the time Remmick arrives at the Juke Joint, he is ready to match cultural history and ancestry woes with Smoke and Stack.
Conclusion
Sinners is not a musical, but the two main songs, Sammy’s and Remmick’s, are a history lesson that will spiritually move even the most racist of vermin. Ryan Coogler has given us a horror film as the main dish, but it is the appetizer (history) and the dessert (foot-stomping music) that turn this film into a bloody feast for the soul.
Ryan Coogler’s movie is advertised as a Southern Gothic Horror film that explores the racial tension of 1930s Mississippi, but what I saw was the revelation that we are every man, every woman and every child…and that…the devil rides on a beast called racism.
Do go see the film as soon as possible, cause the rocky road to Dublin awaits you.
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