DYODM SINNERS

Okay so I didn’t watch anything new last month. In fact, the only thing I saw was Sinners. This marks my 3rd viewing; once in IMAX, then in a normal theater, and finally at home with subtitles. 

After these three viewings, my opinion on the movie hasn’t changed. It’s still an absolute blast, and I’d recommend it to anyone even remotely interested in the concept. But also, I think it does have a few problems that I don’t see brought up super frequently and it’s kinda weirding me out.  So I’m just gonna ramble about it for a bit.

Alright, so I want to be super clear: I love Sinners. I think it deserves all the success and accolades it is receiving and I don’t want this to turn into a CinemaSins style takedown where I just nitpick random inconsequential garbage. So to start this off, I’m gonna talk about

THE GOOD

Sorry in advance if this seems rushed, but you already know this movie does a lot of things right. First things first, the cast is incredible. Michael B. Jordan and his brother, Michael C. Jordan (The B stands for Blue and the C stands for Crimson) play the twins so perfectly and Miles Canton is going to be a huge name in the coming years if he can keep this up, given that his debut performance is already this good. 

The build up in the first half of the movie is excellent too. So much is communicated about the characters and locations but none of it feels like an exposition dump. You’re just immersed into a what initially seems like a grounded period piece and left to absorb all of the little details. An issue that comes up a lot in stories with supernatural elements is that they tend to be really, really dull if you remove the fantasy. Like, take Death of a Unicorn as an example. It’s a perfectly serviceable and fun little ride, but I literally couldn’t even tell you the names of any of the characters and I just saw it a few months ago. Their relationships are all extremely basic and paint-by-numbers.  If you remove the Unicorns from that story, you’re left with nothing. 

Sinners is the exact opposite. I actively wanted to see Smoke and Annie / Stack and Mary rekindle their romances, and for Sammie to find success pursuing music. Even the minor characters are played so well that you can’t help but root for them. If the Vampires never showed up, this still would be great (and honestly I might’ve even liked it more, but we’ll get to that). 

All of this is elevated immensely by the soundtrack, but again, you’ve already heard how great it is so I won’t dwell on it. The way it evolves from blues-y acoustics to synth-tinged metal that would feel at home in a Doom game is incredible though. 

One thing that I will dwell on is THAT scene in the middle. You know the one.  When the spirits from other time periods start showing up, and the modern musical elements kick in, it’s just absolute magic. The first time I saw it, my jaw was on the floor through the whole thing, and every time after that I’ve glanced over at other people seeing it for the first time and their reactions have been the same. I really think that we’re going to be talking about this scene for the rest of time just for how captivating it is. And I almost wonder if this scene being THAT good kinda carries the rest of the movie. Because most of the stuff that happens after it wraps up falls into

THE BAD

Okay, not really. There’s still plenty of solid scenes in the back half, but once Sinners officially stops being about people and starts being about Vampires, it definitely feels a bit off. Almost like it went through some reshoots, or something changed in the script at the final hour. This is most obvious during the montage scene with Annie’s voice over. The editing feels sorta janky, like they’re working around background elements that no longer make sense. You can really feel it in the big fight scene where the Vampires finally storm the building. There are absolutely extras in the background fighting them off that haven’t been shown or mentioned at all up until this point. And again, I really don’t want to be pedantic, but there were like 50 goddamn Vampires coming in to fight 6 humans. This should’ve been over before it started. 

The pacing on the way here is super janky too. The first half was so deliberate, with a ton of nuance and emphasis placed on each individual scene. Compare that to the back half and it feels like a completely different movie. The Garlic scene is a cute homage to The Thing, but like, did it really need to be there? Delta Slim getting to go out in a unique way is a nice thought, but the Vampires suddenly switching from sprinting around at full speed to shambling towards him like zombies completely undercuts it. And Grace letting the vampires in feels like it comes way too fast. I understand that she’s worried about her kid, but she can literally see that the Vampires haven’t left. There’s no reason to not just wait it out. 

I think the intention here was to speed up what pace and go for a completely off the rails vibe, kinda like the ending of The Cabin In The Woods, but something’s missing. Maybe the problem was with the Vampires being shown off too much too early? For the entire second half of Sinners the threat has been very firmly established, so we’ve had a ton of time to digest what exactly is going on. Whereas in Cabin, all of the spectacle is mentioned, but not shown until it’s time for them to actually start doing things. This gives the elevator scene an immense amount of punch, which Sinners kinda lacks for me.

One last thing: This isn’t about the movie itself, but rather discussion around it. I am begging you all, PLEASE stop asking for this to turn into a franchise. We do not need an HBO Mini Series on Choctaw Vampire Hunters and we don’t need a 90’s crime drama centered around Stack and Mary in Chicago either. Sinners is a great movie, but I do not wish to enter the Sinnerverse. 

Alright, I am officially done talking about this movie. If I watch it again, you all have permission to egg my house. Next month is going to be a return to form. It’s July 9th as I write this, and I’ve already seen two new movies in theaters, plus I have plans to check out at least two more in the coming weeks. Hope everyone’s doing well out there!