by Oscar O’Sullivan

The first hour of Sinners is not exactly indicative of the film that everyone is raving about. The film that is taking cinemas by storm doesn’t exist until hour two, but it also could not exist without that first act. For as shocking, exciting and genre-busting the main event is, the endless exposition we must navigate to get there is nothing special, a predictable spoon-feed of characters and backstories and relationships that feels tired in the moment and positively comatose in comparison to the rollercoaster of insanity that follows. It’s a hard pill to swallow, even if it is a necessary one, though I’d nearly feel comfortable skipping ahead to the good part on a rewatch. Director Ryan Coogler almost seems to know the first half is a necessary evil, almost invariably flashing back to earlier scenes at the moment they are paid off, allowing you the satisfaction of revisiting that moment with new knowledge without the effort of starting the film all over again. If it seems that I’m coming down hard on the film, that’s because I can’t begin to discuss the exceptional second half without first trudging through the banality of the first.

Sinners begins “in media res”, sharing a brief explanation of the central mythological conceit before introducing Sammie Moore (Miles Caton), stumbling into church in a bloodied, mangled state, clutching at the broken shaft of a guitar. Flash back to one day earlier, with Sammy finishing his work in the cotton fields early so he can meet his older cousins, Smoke and Stack (both played by Michael B. Jordan, Coogler’s go-to star). The twins are infamous in their Mississippi hometown, and have returned after a long absence during which they got into all sorts of scrapes that the film often alludes to. They’ve come back with huge quantities of cash and illicit liquor from Chicago, aiming to set up their own Prohibition-era speakeasy for the local sharecroppers. After buying a derelict barnhouse from a racist businessman, the twins set about gathering up the pieces needed to fill the joint with music, booze and, most importantly, paying customers. And so our cast of eventual survivors is filled out – jaded wise woman Annie (Wunmi Mosaku), drink-addled bluesman Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo), slow-witted bouncer Cornbread (Omar Benson Miller), Chinese grocers Grace and Bo (Li Jun Li and Yao), mixed-race party girl Mary (Hailee Steinfeld) and more are roped into the venture for one reason or another, and most of them have a long history with the twins that is exposited in a fairly blunt, effective but graceless manner – at times it feels like having a Wikipedia plot summary read at you, which I fear is also true of this portion of the review. After the opening scene so perfectly created a tone of impending dread, there’s an inevitable disappointment to being strung along through an endless sequence of low-stakes dialogue scenes with very little in the way of visual excitement.

The one reminder of what’s to come is the introduction of Remmick (Jack O’Connell), literally dropping into the film from out the air as he flees a band of Native hunters, seeking refuge in a small shack before taking a bite out of the owners. In case you weren’t already aware, Sinners is a vampire flick, though it’s use of the undead bears a structural similarity to zombie survival. But before we can learn more about the undead threat, we have to spend some more time pretending to be in a drama film, with the sun setting and the revelries getting underway at the barn. This “Juke Joint” becomes the sole location for the remainder of the film, well over half the runtime, calling to mind The Thing and other similar isolation horror stories. Eager young Sammy is called up to perform, and something magical happens, both in-universe and out. As Sammy plays, the opening narration is repeated – there are musicians so spectacularly gifted that their songs call forth spirits from both the past and future – and lo and behold, here is a tribal dancer, there is a man in multicoloured spandex shredding an electric guitar. Not a single partygoer pays attention to the DJ spinning records on the stage, nor to the Medieval Chinese performer, nor the gaggle of twerking clubbers. For the first time, the film is alive, awake, engaging, telling a story in a way that only film can, blurring the layers of fictionality in a completely casual manner and creating a transcendent musical soundscape that builds on and surpasses the (already great) score of the preceding scenes. And somehow, its stays this good.

Much credit has to be given to the score, crafted by the two-time Oscar winner Ludwig Göransson, one of the most prolific film composers working today. After his work with Christopher Nolan, Marvel, Star Wars and other Coogler projects, this might be Göransson’s most unique work yet, blending traditional scoring with authentic folk music and fusion styles. The soundtrack stands alone as great listening.

The tension ramps up by degrees as Remmick and his vampiric sidekicks come knocking, politely asking to join the hootenanny and sulking outside when they’re turned away. Sinners gets great mileage out of that most underutilised of vampire rules, their inability to enter without an invite. Watch in horror they pick off stragglers who step outside, adding them to the undead horde and using their faces to infiltrate the club. The film grows more bawdy, more bloody, and more emotional – heroes are forced to reckon with the horrific fates of their loved ones, murdered and replaced by something inhuman. A trace of the true self remains, but each vampire is but one fraction of a collective consciousness spearheaded by the smiling Irish ringleader, at once affable and terrible, a magnificent villain performance from Jack O’Connell. Every character who is turned subtly mimics his performance, until our core survivors are outnumbered by a unified army of unkillable monsters. The same steady hand and focus on setup that made the first half a watchable drama now makes the second half an ecstatic thriller with a gloriously bloody climax. Character beats are paid off, themes are fully realised, Coogler makes good on his promise that, if you bear with him as he mucks through the weeds, the sun will come up and burn away every problem you could have had.

Maybe it is all a touch slapdash, overstuffed and a little overambitious. But when you’ve got a blank check to tell this sort of story, why play it safe? Even the inclusion of a post-credits scene manages to feel like a bold subversion – rather than teasing that there’s more to come, it adds a final twist to the tale and an extra dose of emotional resonance. More than anything, it’s wonderful to see a truly original movie connect so well with audiences, a film sold on nothing more than star power, a strong premise and shockingly good word-of-mouth. Hollywood needs to pay attention – there is a way forward, and making bold moves like this is necessary to keep the movies alive. Sinners, in spite of how uneven it is on the whole, more than earns a 9/10 for its raw ambition and how conclusively it sticks the landing.