Vampire movies are a staple of the horror genre, and while it may seem like just another random version, Ryan Coogler’s 2025 film Sinners is anything but the average vampire movie.
Sinners is a horror, drama, and period piece set in 1932, Mississippi, following two brothers, Smoke and Stack. The film follows the brothers across a single day as they try to open their juke joint. As the day turns to night, Vampires pick them off one by one until the juke devolves into a full brawl between a group of remaining humans and an army of vampires.
The film takes place across such a short period of time and mostly in the same area, making the film feel so much more intense and grand in scale.
The film confines itself to a smaller cast of characters, allowing them all to be more memorable and fleshed out. Like in most movies, Sinners has its comic relief characters, but it also utilizes them for drama and vice versa. All characters have their comedic moments, which humanize them more in a film full of monsters.
The film’s standout performance is Michael B. Jordan as Smoke and Stack. Sinners follows the trend of many recent films like The Monkey, The Alto Knights, and Sonic the Hedgehog 3, of having one actor portraying multiple roles. While this could easily pose problems, Michael B. Jordan manages to portray the two brothers so differently that by the end, the audience barely remembers one person playing them. Jordan portrays Stack as more loud-mouthed, vulgar, and assertive, while Smoke is more of the brains between the two. Smoke is a slick talker who thinks more before speaking, unlike his brother’s brash and outlandish way of speaking. The film represents their differences by dressing Smoke in cooler tones like blue, while Stack is dressed in deeper reds and maroons.
Hailee Steinfeld and Wunmi Mosaku’s portrayals of Mary and Annie, who are each of the brothers’ love interests, along with Jayme Lawson, whose character Pearline is the love interest to Smoke and Stack’s cousin Sammie, help present the movie’s romantic themes in a spectrum of ways. Mary and Stack’s relationship represents toxic love within the film; their romance is built on the principle that they are not good for each other, and the only true way for them to be safe is to be apart. Sammie and Pearline represent young love and infatuation. The two are enamored by the other’s presence the moment they first meet on screen, which leads to their short-lived yet passionate affair. While Sammie and Pearline’s short romance also contains hints of tragedy, the true tragic romance of the film is Annie and Smoke’s passionate yet tragic love. Annie and Smokes’ love is tied to a shared loss from their past, which stops them from fully exploring their love together. While the film’s script is fantastic, the film’s best parts are the things it does not deliberately tell the viewer. The music, metaphors, and visuals truly bring that script to life in such a beautiful way.
Director Ryan Coogler packs the film full of beautiful shots that manage to be so colorful yet so bleak, so lively yet so depressing. The visuals allow for scenes to stand without any dialogue and still be highlights of the film. Coogler uses music and fire to represent freedom. Whether it be Sammie’s angelic voice bringing a strong sense of joy and freedom to all those listening or flames freeing characters from life, the subtext is strong within the film.
Coogler manages to craft such a strong tale about race that could only be told in a period piece without confining itself to only the period it’s set in. During the extensive musical sequence in the middle of the film, the screen is filled with elements of black culture through both music and dancing from all across time to show how even this story set in the 1930s has timeless connections to society.
The film uses racial themes and elements to its advantage without having the entire plot revolve around them. The vampires infiltrating this sanctuary for people of color that the brothers have built represent gentrification and several other ideas related to race in society. Coogler masterfully creates a tale about how black culture has evolved while still holding onto many fundamentals that are constant across time. The film perfectly uses the vampires and other supernatural elements to tell a story that works as a commentary on the society of both the time the film is set in and modern day. While the amazing practical and computer-generated imagery and effects make the vampires incredibly scary and their defeat very cathartic, the true emotional catharsis for Sammie and Smoke is tied more to realism in ways that help cement the film in the period it takes place within.
“Sinners” cannot be discussed without bringing up the music and score. Music is such an instrumental part of the plot that the soundtrack and score needed to be fantastic, and composer Ludwig Göransson, along with the rest of the extensive music department that worked on the film, does not disappoint. The score pulls influences from music all across time and from multiple different cultures while still focusing on black culture. These elements culminate in one of the best film scores ever made.
Some viewers may have an issue with how long it takes for the plot to introduce the vampires and get to the horror elements, but this allows for the film to develop the characters more, which leads to the audience caring about the characters and their relationships more once the vampires do arrive.
Sinners is much more than just another go in the vampire horror genre. Ryan Coogler’s direction, paired with Michael B. Jordan’s dual performance, paired with a small yet powerful ensemble cast, breathes life into a story that’s both intimate and epic. From its vibrant yet haunting visuals to its deeply symbolic use of music and fire, every element works in harmony to create a film that lingers with the viewer long after the credits roll. Sinners is not only a standout horror film but an erotic, bold, genre-defying work that uses vampires to reflect on love, freedom, loss, race, and resilience in ways that feel both timely and timeless.
