A vampire bites you, and you turn into a bloodsucker yourself.
Is that such a bad thing?
“Sinners” (R, 137 minutes, in theaters) suggests maybe not. At least, it allows vampires to make a case for the living joining them as the nocturnal undead.
Writer-director Ryan Coogler’s film is far from your typical vampire movie. In fact, to call it a vampire movie diminishes what it is. It blends Black Prohibition-era gangsters, the rural South, roadhouse blues as an expression of Black culture, sex, spiritualism, immigrants, the Klan, vampires and more in a way that makes it hard to slap any genre label on it.
Michael B. Jordan plays twins Stack, left, and Smoke in “Sinners.” (Warner Bros. Pictures)
That, in part, is probably why it’s so challenging, so compelling, so entertaining. Just as it’s hard to categorize “Sinners,” it’s difficult to decipher exactly what messages it delivers, at least on first viewing. Certainly the film involves cultural identity, cultural appropriation, cultural assimilation, and, of course, good ol’ racism (which, damn us humans, still won’t go away).
Maybe, in depicting an increasing number of vampires attacking those unlike them, Coogler, who wrote and directed the film, is likening the undead to the MAGA cult. You know, be like us or suffer (or, be like us and suffer).
The story involves twins Smoke and Stack (Smokestack?), both played (brilliantly) by Michael B. Jordan. It’s 1932, and the brothers, decked out in gangster suits, have returned with a stash of money and booze to their hometown in Mississippi after an apparent stint in Chicago working for the Capone mob. They plan to open a remote gin joint where the local Black population can drink and dance to rollicking blues.
Hailee Steinfeld plays Mary, Stack’s longtime romantic interest, in “Sinners.” (Warner Bros. Pictures)
Everything seems to come together, and opening night gets off to a festive start. That is, until three pesky Irish vampires ask if they can join the party.
As vampire movies go, “Sinners” probably most resembles Kathryn Bigelow’s moody “Near Dark” or Robert Rodriguez’s amped-up “From Dusk Till Dawn” – with a lot of “The Color Purple” (um, not a vampire flick) mixed in.
But Coogler’s film – which also boasts a phenomenal atmospheric score by two-time Oscar winner Ludwig Goransson (“Black Panther,” “Oppenheimer”) – stands on its own, taking its place with other first-rate Coogler-Jordan collaborations such as “Fruitvale Station” and “Black Panther.”
“Sinners” deserves further study. I can’t wait to see it again. ***½ (out of four)
Nic gets nutty
If Nicolas Cage stars in a movie, count me in.
He’s a risk-taker. He goes all out, throwing himself into roles, often going over the top. Sometimes he’s great (“Leaving Las Vegas,” “Pig”), but, even when he isn’t, he’s always fascinating (and usually hilarious – sometimes, I imagine, unintentionally).
Which brings us to the new Cage release “The Surfer” (R, 100 minutes, opening in theaters May 2). I didn’t know much about the film going in, only that Cage plays a guy who’s prevented from surfing with his son by a gang of locals. Given the star and the weird premise (“Straw Dogs” on the beach!), I figured the potential for lunacy was high – and I was right.
Lunacy, however, does not always equal good.
Nicolas Cage stars as “The Surfer.” (Roadside Attractions)
Cage’s character returns to the Australian beach where he surfed in his youth. On the verge of divorce, he brings along his reluctant teen son with hopes of sharing the sublime experience of riding the big waves together.
But as they approach the water, they’re stopped by a group of young male thugs whose motto is, “Don’t live here, don’t surf here.” The son leaves, but the father stays in a parking lot overlooking the beach, seethes in anger and frustration, and watches the macho surfers below. The surfers are part of a cult led by the older Scally (Julian McMahon), who guides them through various rituals and teachings about manhood.
Scally and his followers torment the father, who seeks help from the police to no avail and quickly sinks into madness, degradation and despair. Originally appearing at the beach in his Lexus and negotiating the purchase of a seaside dream home where he lived as a boy, the father loses everything, and is reduced to drinking foul water from a beach bathroom and … well, I won’t even get into what his dining habits become.
While presenting the father’s downhill slide, director Lorcan Finnegan and a feverish Cage build tension to an almost unbearable degree. But the awfulness of it all goes on and on – I mean, how many times can you endure seeing a big, moist turd in a drinking fountain before you say, “No more!”?
Clearly, “The Surfer” is about toxic masculinity, and it’s no stretch to see it as a commentary on the familiar “us vs. them” mentality regarding immigration issues. The film is ambitious and uncompromising. But it’s also repulsive and exhausting, without enough of a payoff to make it worth enduring. When I watched two people depart early from the screening I attended, I can’t say I wasn’t jealous. **
Short takes
“Warfare” (R, 95 minutes, in theaters). Alex Garland (“Civil War”) and former Navy SEAL Ray Mendoza wrote and directed this no-frills snapshot of war, based on a harrowing real-life event experienced by Mendoza’s platoon in 2006 Iraq. While on a surveillance mission, the Alpha One platoon takes over a multi-story house and soon is under siege by enemy forces. Presented in real time, with little context provided, “Wartime” attempts to show what it feels like to be in the middle of action, where you have to act quickly and there are no guarantees of survival.
I’ve never been in combat, but my father fought in Korea, and he said the beginning of “Saving Private Ryan” was the most accurate depiction of battle he had seen on film (though he said the real deal was even worse). He’s no longer around, but my guess is he’d have similar feelings about “Warfare.” ***
“A Working Man” (R, 116 minutes, in theaters). Gravelly voiced Brit Jason Statham could be the most charismatic action-film star working in movies today. Here he plays a construction worker who takes on human traffickers working for the Russian mob. It’s all very familiar, a combination of Liam Neeson actioner and “Death Wish” retread, with the usual cardboard villains (boy, those Russian gangsters are tacky dressers). But Statham’s appeal makes this a good bad movie, entertainingly ridiculous. ***
“The Amateur” (PG-13, 122 minutes, in theaters). Rami Malek stars in this by-the-numbers spy thriller, a remake of a 1981 film starring John Savage. Malek plays a CIA cryptographer who seeks revenge after his wife is killed by terrorists. The usual hijinks ensue. **
“Drop” (PG-13, 95 minutes, in theaters). Talk about bad first dates: Violet (Meghann Fahy) meets with a photographer (Brandon Sklenar) she’s been in contact with through a dating app. As they take a window seat at a swanky high-rise Chicago restaurant, Violet starts getting messages on her phone that, if she doesn’t kill her date, her daughter and sister will be executed. Though initially suspenseful, the thriller becomes increasingly, insultingly absurd. **
** Click here for Tim Miller’s previous movie columns for Cape Cod Wave **
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Tim Miller, Movie Critic
Tim Miller is co-president of the Boston Society of Film Critics and a Tomatometer-approved critic. He teaches film and journalism at Cape Cod Community College in West Barnstable. You can contact Tim at [email protected] or follow him onTwitter @TimMillerCritic. Or you can ignore him completely.
