Sinners Parent Guide

After coming back from The Great War, twin brothers Smoke and Stack (both Michael B. Jordan) struggled at home in the Mississippi Delta so they took off for Chicago. Now, years later, they’re back with their pockets full of money, their truck full of liquor, and big plans for turning the old sawmill into a juke joint. They’ve even hired their gifted cousin “Preacher Boy” Sammie (Miles Caton) to come and play the blues on his resonator guitar.

Things are looking good, but Smoke and Stack know the Delta well so they’re keeping one eye open for the Klan. What they don’t know is that there are dangers stranger than the Klan coming through Mississippi, and they like the blues, hate garlic, and want something darker than whiskey to drink…

I can’t think of another Jim-Crow-vampire-drama, so I have to give Sinners full points for originality. Even better, this film is actually good – it took a good premise and made a good movie. Weird how rare that is. There’s also a dynamic cast and a dynamite soundtrack which bounces through a lot of genres, but is mostly good, old-fashioned blues guitar. As a plus for music fans, an older version of Preacher Boy is played by blues legend Buddy Guy. This tells you how seriously the movie takes the music.

There are a few hiccups, but not many. My biggest issue is that the vampire element is mostly a third-act deal, and I just got lost in the period drama of the first two acts – still a testament to the film’s storytelling, but a little jarring when I had to pivot over to the undead. There are also a few moments where the soundtrack literally drowns out important dialogue, but nothing you can’t figure out from context.

For all its successes, Sinners won’t be a big hit as a family film. There’s a fair bit of sexual content, which seems to be endemic to vampire movies (but no nudity). There’s also a huge amount of bloody violence, which shouldn’t shock you: between vampires and the Klan, somebody is going to get killed. Then there’s the drinking and profanity you could expect from the entire film revolving around opening a drinking establishment. But while you can infer the content from the summary, the movie has a lot more to offer that adult genre fans just might want to see for themselves.