⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ | Rated R | 137 minutes

It’s cliche to say “live each day like it could be your last,” but cliches exist because they are often tied to truth.

There was a day, a day where you had the best time ever. Surrounded by family or friends, or both. Maybe it was your prom, a wedding reception, a friend’s house party… whatever it was, I bet you remember it fondly. It might also have been the very last time you would ever see all those people in the same place. Life happens and we move apart, we change locations, we change careers… and the past can never be again. You just didn’t know it at the time.

Ryan Coogler’s new supernatural action-horror film “Sinners” taps into this feeling in ways I was never expecting it to. When is the last time you got emotional during a horror film? I certainly can’t remember the last time I was moved like that. Most horror films exist to make you cringe, scream and hide behind your popcorn. Coogler’s “Sinners” taps into something far more primal.

It’s the 1930’s and we’re well into the Great Depression. The dust bowl is raging in the Great Plains states, prohibition is on the verge of being repealed, and the deep south is wrangled in Jim Crow. Twin brothers Smoke and Stack, both played by Michael B. Jordan, come back to their hometown in Mississippi.

Smoke and Stack are a pair of enterprising young men with some vague gang ties. They are players and hustlers living large for 1932, having made some money through possible nefarious means in Chicago before escaping back to the south with plans to open an underground jazz club.

The film has a slow build after a teaser intro where a weary and blood-covered Sammie (Miles Caton) stumbles into his father’s church (Saul Williams) carrying a busted guitar handle. A few quick flashes reveal grotesque demons with red eyes…. but that’s all the glimpse we’ll get until the second half of the film.

For some, that may be a long time to wait for a payoff in a film that’s largely being advertised as a jump-scare horror. For me, it was worth the wait. As the story unfolds with Smoke and Stack’s influence among their small town, characters have a chance to develop into rich archetypes that you can invest in.

As Smoke and Stack work to put their jazz club together we are introduced to the Chow family (Helena Hu and Yao), Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo), Cornbread (Omar Miller), and love interests Mary (Hailee Steinfeld), Beatrice (Tenaj Jackson), and Pearline (Jayme Lawson). This stacked cast brings life to this painting of 1930’s black culture in an imaginative and raw way.

At its core, “Sinners,” is a vampire horror… but it’s also so much more than that. It’s commentary on the KKK and the current state of racism in America; about how white supremacists suck the lifeblood out of the black community still to this day. The way the film does that may be a bit on-the-nose, but it’s effective at making its point.

Describing this movie as a “supernatural action-horror” merely scratches the surface. It’s a deep look at the music scene of the 30’s, racial tensions in the South, and a lesson for chasing your dreams in life.