Today, I will be doing a spoiler-free review of Sinners. Sinners is a movie that just released about a week and a half ago, and it’s easily my favorite release of this year so far, and one of the best movies I’ve seen this decade. The elite directing and amazing performances from all the leads were the main reason for this movie being as good as it was. This movie follows twin brothers who are trying to leave their troubled lives behind, who return to their Mississippi hometown to start again, only to discover that an even greater evil is waiting to welcome them back. This is also an R-rated horror movie, but it isn’t your typical horror movie at all. There aren’t any jump scares at all, and the “scariest” part of the movie is probably just the violent kills. The idea behind the vampires in this movie is very very interesting. This movie is set in the Jim Crow South in 1932, and the exploration of freedom and how the vampires can “set you free” in an era where all black people are highly oppressed was great symbolism. The music is also another absolutely huge part in this movie, and how it can be used for good and evil. The music is used as a plot device at times but also to just show the joy and resilience of black culture in blues music especially during this time period.
The antagonist of this movie is Remmick played by Jack O’Connel, and I really loved his performance. The movie changes its tone immediately when he’s first introduced onto the screen, and he knocks it out of the park from there. The other three main standouts were Michael B. Jordan as Smoke and Stack, both of the twins. He absolutely kills it and I’m comfortable in saying this is the best performance of his career, as he has to play two different characters with two different personalities and he kills both of them. Hailee Steinfeld as Mary, who’s chasing Stack as she’s in love with him. She probably has the best pure acting performance in the entire movie, there’s a point a little over halfway through the movie where she turns it up a notch and she’s just next level from there. Finally, maybe my favorite character in the movie is Miles Caton as Sammie, who is the younger Cousin of the twins. His performance is also phenomenal, but his singing and his importance to this movie cannot be understated. He’s just so good and there’s one specific one-shot scene that he’s just outstanding in, and it might be one of my favorite scenes in any movie ever. The overall symbolism in this movie is just something to behold. There’s such a great and deep meaning behind this movie that I can’t really talk about without spoiling, but it truly is special. The cinematography and dialogue are also fantastic, as it’s also one of the most visually stunning movies to look at this decade.
I always rate movies and I rate them based on 10 things in the movie. Those things are: acting, cinematography, pacing, score, symbolism, side characters, ending, plot, main character, and dialogue. I gave this movie a 96/100, and as you can tell from how I’m talking about this the movie is just so special. The ending is also great, just make sure to stay for the mid credit scene. It adds another level of depth to the movie and its characters and even its deeper meaning. Just an overall stunner of a film, and one that I think absolutely should watch.
