Sinners Film Review: Is Ryan Coogler’s Oscar-Winning Horror Worth Watching?

Unless you’ve been living completely off the grid, you’ll know that Sinners has been dominating the conversation around cinema for the past year. Ryan Coogler’s supernatural horror thriller landed a record 16 Academy Award nominations – two more than Titanic ever managed – and walked away with four wins, including Best Actor for Michael B. Jordan and Best Original Screenplay for Coogler himself. Now that it’s streaming on Sky Cinema and NOW, this Sinners film review settles the question: does it deserve all the fuss?

Yes. Emphatically, yes. Here’s why.

What Is Sinners About?

Set in 1932 in the Mississippi Delta, Sinners follows twin brothers Smoke and Stack – both played by Michael B. Jordan in a virtuoso dual performance – who’ve returned to the Jim Crow South after years spent working for Al Capone’s Chicago operation. Their plan is simple enough: buy a disused sawmill, open a juke joint, and build something of their own in a world that wants to stop them at every turn.

They’ve brought cash, cases of Irish beer, and more ambition than Mississippi knows what to do with. What they haven’t reckoned on is a young blues prodigy called Sammie – played in an extraordinary film debut by Miles Caton – whose musical gift draws something far darker than local hostility.

By nightfall, vampires are at the door. And not the romantic kind.

The premise sounds outlandish on paper. On screen, it feels completely inevitable. Coogler earns every single frame of it.

Michael B. Jordan Delivers the Best Performance of His Career

The Academy rarely gets Best Actor right. This year, they did. Jordan plays two men who share a face and a history but are fundamentally different in almost every other way – Smoke the serious, measured, pragmatic twin; Stack the restless charmer who wants everything the Delta refuses to give him. He never lets either character blur into the other. Not once.

The physicality is extraordinary. The emotional range even more so. There’s a scene in the second act – I won’t spoil it, but you’ll know it when you see it – where Jordan does more in thirty seconds than most actors manage across an entire film. His win for Best Actor is the sixth time a Black man has won in the category, and it’s richly deserved.

The supporting cast more than holds its own around him. Miles Caton is astonishing as Sammie, finding genuine soul in what could easily have been a plot device. Hailee Steinfeld, Jack O’Connell, and Delroy Lindo bring real weight to what might have been backdrop characters. And Wunmi Mosaku is quietly, disturbingly terrifying in a way I won’t explain here – you need to see it cold.

It’s worth noting that Sinners grossed over $370 million worldwide on a budget of around $90-100 million – not just a critical success, then, but a genuine commercial hit. Horror, as a genre, rarely gets this kind of recognition. Sinners may have changed that for good.

Ryan Coogler’s Direction Is Something Else

Coogler has always been a director of real ambition – Fruitvale Station, Creed, Black Panther – but Sinners is different. It’s his first original screenplay, and the confidence of it is striking. He’s made a film that works on multiple levels simultaneously: a horror movie, a period drama, a meditation on Black creativity and its exploitation, and a deeply felt story about twins and what it means to come home.

The fact that it never buckles under the weight of all those ambitions is the real achievement. Most films at this scale settle for spectacle. Coogler wanted more, and he got it.

Autumn Durald Arkapaw’s cinematography – which earned her the Oscar for Best Cinematography, making her the first woman ever to win in that category – gives the film a rich, tactile quality. The Delta looks simultaneously beautiful and suffocating. Ludwig Goransson’s score, his third Best Original Score Oscar win, moves between Delta blues, gospel, and something genuinely unsettling that shifts mood without you quite noticing it happening.

Where to Watch Sinners in the UK

Sinners is currently streaming on Sky Cinema and NOW as part of a standard subscription. It’s also available to rent or buy on Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV. Sky subscribers can watch it at no extra cost as of this week.

The film carries a 15 certificate from the BBFC. There’s considerable violence, some graphic horror imagery, and scenes that earn that rating honestly. This is not a slow-burn drama with a scare bolted on at the end – Coogler commits to the horror fully when the time comes, and it’s intense.

If you’re the kind of viewer who found recent UK TV dramas like Saturday Night Live UK or the final Peaky Blinders film satisfying but safe, Sinners is the antidote. It takes real risks and they pay off.

Any Criticisms?

In fairness, Sinners isn’t flawless. The first act builds deliberately – viewers who prefer their horror to arrive early will need patience. The film takes its time establishing Smoke, Stack, Sammie, and the world of the juke joint before the supernatural elements kick in. That patience is rewarded, but it’s a real ask.

Some of the film’s larger ideas – particularly around cultural appropriation and the blues as a tradition claimed, stolen, and reclaimed – feel slightly underexplored given how central they are to the plot. You leave wanting more of those threads rather than feeling they’ve been fully paid off.

These are minor complaints about a film operating at a level most directors never reach. Sinners picked up 16 nominations and won four – and while pundits will talk for years about what it didn’t win, what it did win it thoroughly deserved.

Our verdict: 9/10. Sinners is the rare blockbuster that has something genuine to say and the craft to say it. If you haven’t watched it yet, this weekend is the time.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Sinners based on a true story?

No. Sinners is an original screenplay written by Ryan Coogler. The film draws on the real history of the Jim Crow era and the blues tradition of the 1930s Mississippi Delta, but the characters and plot are entirely fictional.

How long is Sinners?

Sinners has a runtime of approximately 2 hours 18 minutes. It’s a substantial watch but rarely feels its length.

Is Sinners suitable for children?

No. Sinners is rated 15 by the BBFC and contains strong violence, graphic horror sequences, and scenes that are not appropriate for children or younger teenagers.

Did Sinners win Best Picture at the 2026 Oscars?

No. Despite receiving a record 16 nominations, Sinners won four awards at the 98th Academy Awards: Best Actor (Michael B. Jordan), Best Original Screenplay (Ryan Coogler), Best Cinematography (Autumn Durald Arkapaw), and Best Original Score (Ludwig Goransson). It did not win Best Picture.