The Film Experience

In the Split Decision series, our writers pair up and face off on an Oscar-nominated movie one loves and the other doesn't. Tonight, LYNN LEE and NICK TAYLOR discuss Sinners.

NICK: Lynn, I think you’re one of the only people on this site - maybe in the entire world - whose opinion on Sinners I don’t know. The most nominated film in Oscar’s history deserves a volley before the big night! For my part, I think Ryan Coogler’s ambition is off the charts, and I genuinely can’t wait to see what he and his team are going to do with their blank check. The execution of that ambition, from plotting to formal execution, is very uneven to me, and I have a hard time reconciling what’s so exciting with what’s undernourished. But before I continue, please tell me what you think of Sinners!!

LYNN: Funny, I feel like I've been singing the praises of Sinners so much lately, I'm finding it difficult to avoid repeating myself! It was my #1 movie of 2025, and I think it deserved many, if not most, of its Oscar nominations...

This isn't something I'd have predicted a year ago: I did not have "Ryan Coogler directs Southern Gothic vampire musical” on my movie bingo card, much less that I would love it as much as I did. I don't even like horror movies! But I found this one to be an extraordinarily rich, enthralling viewing (and listening) experience unlike any other I've ever had. I love how it mashes up movie and musical genres to create something that's wildly entertaining and suspenseful and at the same time steeped in a quintessentially American historical legacy. If it has a fault, it is maybe a bit thematically overstuffed, but I didn't find that to impair my enjoyment. What about it didn't work for you?

NICK: Christ, how have I already wiped those volleys from my mind? Last week feels like months ago.

I don’t mind a film being thematically overstuffed, especially when it’s going for swings as wild and unique as Coogler’s. There’s some really incredible stuff happening in Sinners, and I’m rooting for it in several categories. But there’s a lot that doesn’t totally work for me, from scene-level quibbles to issues baked into the whole project. I’ve complained about Autumn Durald Arkapaw’s cinematography a lot, but I think it’s underlit and unimaginatively framed in scene after scene. There’s a lot of plopping actors in the middle of a wide, empty, shallow focus frame without much attention to their faces, blurring them and their surroundings. I also don’t think the aspect ratio swapping is elegantly integrated, making the editing feel more disjointed as a result. Still, the visual styling has been such a consistent high point for Sinners’ fans that I want to volley it back to you before I go further. Are you rooting for Autumn Durald Arkapaw to win the Oscar?

LYNN: Truthfully, I'm rooting for Train Dreams in cinematography - but I'd be happy with an Arkapaw win. You make fair points on her lensing in Sinners, though I didn't see the movie in IMAX, so I can't really comment on the aspect ratio shifts. I've seen a lot of criticism of the lighting, and while I'll concede some of the nighttime outdoor scenes are a touch underlit, I'm not sure that it isn't deliberate. In at least one case (which I've written about here), I think it actually heightens the cognitive dissonance the film's going for, to wonderfully eerie effect.

In any event, while the overall look of Sinners is obviously a big part of its power, I don't think the cinematography is the most distinctive component of that look - at least, as compared with the production design, costumes, and visual effects. For me, these elements all come together to create a compelling, lived-in world that feels equally convincingly anchored in fantasy and history. Do you agree, or do you have other issues with the visualization of this story?

NICK: First, that's a great piece, and I agree about the effectiveness of the underlighting in that sequence. Second, I completely agree about the other visual elements elevating the picture. The photography doesn’t always show them off well, but I still appreciate how much work the costumes, sets, and makeup are doing to make this world so vivid. Frankenstein’s Gothic excesses are likely to win those three categories at the Oscars, but I'm even more impressed by how Sinners details the Mississippi Delta in the early '30s. You learn so much about these characters and their community through their clothing, their style, their homes, and businesses. Locals are just as evocatively realized as the time travelers.

The music is another high point. Granted, I'll be grumbling about Ludwig Göransson winning his third Oscar in eight years, but it's really good, required to bind together the film's disparate musical and cinematic genres at different times, and at others lean hard into one of those fields and have a ball with it. The musical performances also inspire more formal ambition from Coogler and Arkapaw than the non-music scenes. It's also interesting how Sinners negotiates making this club a respite for the townspeople and the protagonists without really dispelling the idea that this could be inviting danger, or is simply deserving of the scorn Sammie's preacher dad gives at the outset.

Still, thinking about the narrative build that leads us into "I Lied to You" and explodes during "Pale Pale Moon" once the vampires properly attack, part of me can't help but wish we'd gotten to stick around with this setup a little longer. I get that this is about a night out getting fucked over by the supernatural - I keep thinking of Lovers Rock for some reason - but I'm not sure the disruption is as thematically interesting as the setup. Making the vampire Irish is a fun wrinkle on his character, and I've enjoyed the different interpretations of what Remmick represents, but none of it convinces me it covers for some fairly basic monster movie plotting in the third act.

A third act, mind you, that throws out ending after ending. Why do we need the shootout with the Klan immediately after the bloody battle with the vampires? Is the violent spectacle of Smoke avenging himself against these white men more cathartic than his goodbye to Sammie? I do love the coda in Chicago, but it feels weirdly integrated into the credits. Am I being overly critical here? How did you interact with these elements of Sinners?

LYNN: On the setup being more compelling than the payoff, I guess it depends on how exactly you define "disruption" and "attack." So long as the vampires continue to test their victims' defenses and pick them off individually, I'd argue the movie finds clever ways to sustain the dramatic and thematic suspense, even if the overall structure of their attacks is fairly standard-issue horror movie plotting. There's something at once hilarious and sad about the pitch of equality, unity, and fraternity Remmick and his growing ranks offer to the holdouts, to the tune of an Irish step-dance no less.

It's essentially a satire of "melting pot," "I don't see color" Americanism that doesn't try to hide the ruthlessness of its brand of assimilation. Yet the resulting multicultural spectacle, corrupted though it is by violence and theft, isn't without a certain appeal, even beauty, which is about as brilliant a summation of American culture as you can get.

I do agree the movie falls more into rote genre mode with the actual action climax (both/all of them, ha - more on that in a moment), i.e., once Grace issues her reckless fuck-you-come-on-in invitation to the vampires. Even then, though, Wunmi Mosaku adds tragic heft with her exit, and Remmick manages to keep things interesting in the downright sacrilegious "baptism" scene, where he gleefully turns the Lord's words against Sammie and reminds us how easily the oppressed can become the oppressors, using their language and tools of oppression. It isn't subtle, but it's powerful and effective, and brings a new, chilling resonance to the opening scene where Sammie's father implores him to come back to the church.

But yes, I could have done without the post-climax action climax involving Smoke vs. the Klan, which felt like a page ripped out of a Tarantino script and didn't seem to serve much purpose other than to show off Jordan's guns (in all senses). On the other hand, I absolutely loved the placement of the coda with older Sammie, Stack, and Mary. Admittedly, that may be because I am so over pointless mid-credits and post-credits scenes, thanks to their overuse by Marvel et al., that it felt like a welcome jolt to watch one that actually adds a hugely meaningful emotional epilogue - and with such economy, too! However, I also think separating out and tucking that scene into the credits made it feel more like a secret, untold story - another moment of choice, near the end of Sammie's life, that bookends his other, equally portentous moment of choice that opened the movie.

That said, I do feel bad for anyone who completely missed it through no fault of their own, other than not wanting to sit through the credits. And while I have no reason to believe it was intended to tease a sequel, I do hope rather fervently that Coogler resists any temptation to do a sequel because that would ruin, or at least cheapen, the perfect melancholy finality of that scene - don't you agree?

NICK: That’s a very lovely way to frame the placement of the last scene. I think the generic structure of Remmick’s perverse assimilationism made me underrate how thematically thorny his mission is, a sentiment I'd extend to the second half of the movie generally. The river dancing scene is pretty fantastic, albeit a bittersweet one, since it's basically the last musical sequence in Sinners. Is asking for more music performances feasible given the film's structure, or should the considerable imagination Coogler displays elsewhere and the repeated invocations of music's power require at least one or two more songs?

You're right about Mosaku's resonance in the end, and she's a reliable presence throughout Sinners. While I quibble with some of the performances individually, the overall ensemble is colorful and energetic, and the peaks are really high. I'm still unsure how to rank Jordan's work, a steep technical challenge he typically manages better when he's not acting opposite himself, and Hailee Steinfeld is never more interesting than her exquisite clothes.

As stacked as this Supporting Actor lineup is, I'm probably rooting hardest for Delroy Lindo to come from behind and take the Oscar for his slippery, superbly detailed performance. The scene of Delta Slim recounting a previous gig with a friend who got lynched will almost certainly be his Oscar clip, deservedly so, yet I'm just as impressed by his bullishness in his introductory scene, and the gut-churning tension he generates during the garlic test before busting out the biggest laugh in the whole movie.

Lindo, the music, and the mise-en-scène are my very favorite things in Sinners, which I still mostly like. It's so uniquely ambitious in its genre-blended perspective on American history and communal action. My actual favorite thing about Sinners might be how beloved it is by these studios and awards bodies that previously didn't have this kind of time for Coogler, Jordan, or Lindo, despite years of exemplary work. I really hope this leads to a proliferation in historically-rooted, generically ambitious Black cinema getting properly funded from as many avenues as possible. Or hell, just more films about the nonwhite people and communities foundational to this country. Lynn, I completely agreed with your sentiment that Coogler shouldn't make a sequel until I imagined a whole film about the Choctaw vampire hunters who show up at the white couple's house. A cool, quietly ambiguous stand-off in the sunset, never to be seen again.

LYNN: You know, it just occurred to me... eating that garlic didn't do any of them any good, did it? Still, as a test, it was a great sequence, and a great turn from fear to laughter, as you note. Lindo is excellent in this, and I don't agree with those who say that his Oscar nomination (or his non-zero chance of a win) is just a career reward. Similarly, while Jordan didn't quite crack my own best actor ballot, I think a lot of people are underselling the work he does to differentiate the twins. They are supposed to be both identical and temperamentally distinct, and he nails that duality.

I would absolutely take a movie about the Choctaw vampire hunters! One of my handful of beefs with Sinners is how little we get of them - just enough of a glimpse to tantalize us, only never to be seen again. I wonder if there were more of them that got left on the cutting floor. It's an example of the thematic overstuffing I was referring to earlier, and yet I can't honestly say the film would be better without that glimpse. Sometimes more is more - and, like you, I would be thrilled if we get more movies that dig deeper into these kinds of undersung cultural legacies. Even better if they involve actual singing!

Any final thoughts? I don't think we're actually all that far apart in our estimation of Sinners, except in degree of enthusiasm and willingness to overlook its flaws. But I've really appreciated your balanced view and astute observations.

NICK: Am I not being hardline enough for a Split Decision? We’re so magnanimous! I think this all pretty much covers my thoughts about Sinners, and talking to you makes me want to rewatch it again after the Oscars. It’s always a pleasure talking with you, Lynn!

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