This week, we’re back to discuss Ryan Coogler’s musical horror film, Sinners. Following a pair of gangster brothers in the 1930s who return home to rural Mississippi to open a juke joint and find themselves facing down a supernatural horror. Blending horror, history, and blues music, it’s a rich and complex film that we also had an absolute blast watching. Topics of discussion include the film’s use of music, its historical setting, use of vampire lore, and recommendations for similar media.
Content warnings: discussions of segregation, racism, murder, lynching, forced religious conversion
Media Mentioned
- Episode 44 – Literary Death Match
- Slow Horses (TV show)
- Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman
- Any Other City by Hazel Jane Plante
- Little Blue Encyclopedia (For Vivian) by Hazel Jane Plante
- Bonus Track dir. Julia Jackman
- Sing Street dir. John Carney
- The 100 Nights of Hero by Isabel Greenberg
- Black Panther dir. Ryan Coogler
- Black Panther: Wakanda Forever dir. Ryan Coogler
- Creed dir. Ryan Coogler
- Queen of Katwe dir. Mira Nair
- Fruitvale Station dir. Ryan Coogler
- Robert Johnson (musician)
- “Me & the Devil” by Soap & Skin
- West Side Story (movie/musical)
- Anna and the Apocalypse dir. John MCPhail
- How to Blow Up a Pipeline dir. Daniel Goldhaber
- Mickey-17 dir, Bong Joon Ho
- “Doubling Up: How ‘Sinners’ and Other Movies Multiply One Actor” by Esther Zuckerman for the New York Times
- Anora dir. Sean Baker
- Poor Things dir. Yorgos Lanthimos
- This Film Is Not Yet Rated dir. Kirby Dick
- Nickel Boys dir. RaMell Ross
- “Ryan Coogler’s Road to Sinners” by Jelani Cobb for the New Yorker
- “Ryan Coogler Didn’t Want to Hide Anymore” by David Sims for the Atlantic
- Puss in Boots: The Last Wish dir. Joel Crawford
- The Vourdalak dir. Adrien Beau
- The Last Voyage of the Demeter dir. André Øvredal
- AMC’s Interview With the Vampire
- Blue Eye Samurai (TV show)
- Geeshie Wiley (musician)
- “The Ballad of Geeshie and Elvie” by John Jeremiah Sullivan for the New York Times
- Rhiannon Giddens (musician)
- A Complete Unknown dir. James Mangold
- Get Out dir. Jordan Peele
- Oddity dir. Damian McCarthy
- “Let’s Talk About the Irish Music in Sinners” by Leah Schnelbach for Reactor
- Dracula by Bram Stoker
- This is England dir. Shane Meadows
- Lord of the Rings: Return of the King dir. Peter Jackson
- Ring Shout by P. Djèlí Clark
- The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle
- American Ghoul by Michelle McGill-Vargas
- The Ballad of Perilous Graves by Alex Jennings
- Lovers Rock dir. Steve McQueen
- Artie and the Wolf Moon by Olivia Stephens
- Abbott by Saladin Ahmed
- Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse
- Daughters of Jubilation by Kara Lee Corthron
- The Diviners by Libba Bray
- My Heart Struck Sorrow by John Honor Jacobs published in A Lush and Seething Hell
- Castlevania: Nocturne
- Lone Women by Victor LaValle
- Trouble the Saints by Alaya Dawn Johnson
- Monsters We Defy by Leslye Penelope
