NFTW: "Sinners" - The Art of Cinematic Alchemy

What's good everyone? Hope you're all doing well. I was left stunned after coming out of the cinema yesterday evening after watching Sinners. After experiencing Ryan Coogler's latest work, I'm fascinated by how supernatural narratives can illuminate historical truths about exploitation and resilience.

Even before the film begins, Coogler signals his artistic intentions through the film's poster strongly inspired by Ernie Barnes' iconic painting "The Sugar Shack." As one of my favorite artists, Barnes' distinctive elongated figures and kinetic energy capture the vitality of Black social spaces and cultural expression. By echoing this visual reference, Coogler immediately connects "Sinners" to a broader tradition of Black art that celebrates community gatherings as sites of both joy and resistance. The poster's stylistic nod to Barnes' work prepares viewers for a film that, like the painting, will explore the complex interplay between celebration and struggle within Black cultural spaces.

Vampires as Metaphor in "Sinners"

Ryan Coogler's "Sinners" transcends conventional genre boundaries through its ingenious use of vampire mythology as a metaphor for cultural appropriation. Set in Depression-era Mississippi, the film follows twin brothers Elijah "Smoke" and Elias "Stack" Moore (both brilliantly portrayed by Michael B. Jordan), World War I veterans and former Chicago gangsters who return to Clarksdale to establish a juke joint for the local Black community.

What's particularly striking is how Coogler transforms the vampire trope from mere horror device into profound cultural commentary. When Sammie's blues performance inadvertently summons vampires led by Irish immigrant Remmick, we're witnessing more than a supernatural threat – we're seeing a powerful allegory for how Black cultural expressions have historically been consumed, appropriated, and exploited by outside forces.

This metaphor reaches its clearest expression when vampire Remmick confronts Sammie with chilling directness: "Sammie, you're the one I came for. Your gifts. I want your stories. I want your songs. We will make beautiful music together." In this moment, Coogler gives us a perfect encapsulation of the exploitative relationship between Black musical innovation and the industry structures that have historically profited from it. The vampire isn't just after blood - he's after cultural essence, creative energy, and authentic expression.

This scene resonated deeply as it reflects a pattern repeated throughout music history – from blues pioneers who died in poverty while their work enriched record executives, to hip-hop artists like The Cold Crush Brothers who saw their contributions to foundational works go uncompensated. Even modern music icons like Prince and TLC fought bitter public battles against industry exploitation, with Prince famously writing "slave" on his face to protest his recording contract.

Jay-Z references this historical exploitation in his lyrics, specifically mentioning The Cold Crush Brothers who suffered when their creative contributions were used without proper credit or compensation – a pattern of cultural vampirism that mirrors what Coogler portrays in "Sinners." What makes the film's metaphor so effective is how it literalizes this predatory relationship, forcing us to see cultural appropriation not as abstract concept but as visceral, physical threat.

The Transcendent Juke Joint Sequence

This tweet perfectly captures what makes the central musical sequence so extraordinary. As Sammie's performance builds, Coogler creates a spellbinding visual and auditory journey through the evolution of Black music. The scene transcends time and space, showing how each musical tradition flows into the next – African polyrhythms morphing into Delta blues, transmuting to funk and rock, and finally culminating in contemporary hip-hop.

What particularly moved me was the inclusion of the Igbo Masquerade dance within this sequence. As someone of Igbo heritage, seeing this cultural expression represented on screen created an unexpectedly personal connection to the film. The Masquerade dance with its distinctive movements, spiritual significance, and elaborate masks wasn't just a stylistic choice but a profound statement on cultural continuity. It creates a visual bridge between pre-colonial African traditions and contemporary Black American cultural expressions. By incorporating this specific cultural reference, Coogler makes concrete what scholars have long discussed theoretically: the direct lineage between West African cultural practices and their transformations in the Americas.

The Blues Continuum: From Mississippi to Rod Wave

The origins of blues music are deeply rooted in the Black American experience of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Born from the work songs, spirituals, field hollers, and oral traditions of enslaved people in the Mississippi Delta region, the blues emerged as a distinct musical form that gave voice to the hardships, joys, and lived realities of Black Americans during and after Reconstruction. These early blues expressions combined African musical elements – call-and-response patterns, blue notes, polyrhythms – with American folk traditions to create something entirely new yet ancestrally connected.

By the 1920s and 30s (the era depicted in "Sinners"), blues had evolved into a more formalised genre with distinctive structures and themes, becoming one of America's first truly original art forms. Yet as the character Delta Slim (powerfully portrayed by Delroy Lindo) observes in one of the film's most pointed moments: "You see white folks like the blues just fine, they just don't like the people that make 'em." This cutting line encapsulates the film's central theme – the persistent pattern of American culture embracing Black creative expressions while simultaneously devaluing or exploiting their creators.

One of the characters that particularly fascinated me was Delta Slim himself – a weathered bluesman who's initially convinced to perform at the juke joint only at the bribery of alcohol. What struck me later was the stunning visual metaphor when he uses that same beer bottle to sacrifice himself fighting the vampires, buying precious time for the others to escape. Coogler's attention to symbolic detail here is masterful – the very substance that both fuels and destroys the artist becomes his final weapon of resistance. It's a poignant commentary on how addiction has historically been both a coping mechanism and an instrument of exploitation in artistic communities, especially among Black musicians whose pain was commodified while their humanity was denied.

The film's exploration of musical evolution finds perfect completion in its soundtrack, particularly in Rod Wave's title track "Sinners." There's a beautiful symmetry in this choice – a contemporary artist whose work represents the modern manifestation of blues sensibilities providing the sonic anchor for a film about the supernatural power of this musical tradition.

Rod Wave stands as perhaps the quintessential modern blues artist in today's musical landscape. Though categorised as hip-hop, his music carries the same emotional weight, lyrical honesty, and melodic pain that characterised the blues masters of the Mississippi Delta. His vulnerable explorations of struggle, pain, and perseverance create a direct through-line from the traditions depicted in the film to contemporary expression.

One of the film's most powerful scenes occurs as the characters drive along an arid road and encounter a chain gang of Black prisoners working under brutal conditions. When Delta Slim recognises some of his former friends among them, he stands and shouts as the car passes by them: "Ya'll hold your heads! YOU HEAR ME? HOLD YOUR HEADS!" This moment resonated deeply with me, as it captures a tradition of encouragement that continues in Black communities today – the call to maintain dignity and strength in the face of systemic oppression. Even now, these same words echo in conversations between Black men navigating harsh environments and seemingly insurmountable odds.

This scene also underscores the historical context from which the blues emerged – the criminalisation of Black bodies, forced labor, and the carceral state that evolved from slavery into the prison system. The work songs of these chain gangs formed one of the crucial building blocks of blues music, channeling collective suffering into expressions of resilience and humanity. By including this moment, Coogler connects the supernatural elements of his story to the very real historical conditions that gave birth to the blues tradition.

This musical continuity reinforces one of the film's central themes: that Black cultural expressions, while constantly evolving in form, maintain core emotional and spiritual elements across generations. The pain expressed by a 1930s blues guitarist and a 2020s melodic rapper may take different sonic forms, but they spring from the same well of lived experience and cultural memory.

Authenticity and Mainstream Success

The commercial success of "Sinners" – grossing $45.6 million in its opening weekend – represents something profound about the evolving landscape of American cinema. This achievement directly challenges the long-standing industry assumption that authentically Black storytelling couldn't achieve mainstream commercial success without being diluted for broader audiences.

This success represents more than just box office numbers; it's a powerful argument for restructuring how stories get told in Hollywood. When creators maintain ownership of their narratives as Coogler did by securing a deal that grants him ownership of the film after 25 years the result is work that resonates more deeply with audiences across demographics. Highly recommend and I’m definitely going to be going back to watch it a few more times.

Until next week. Peace.