One of the biggest movies of 2025 made it to HBO this past week. We are talking Ryan Coogler’s SINNERS. It debuted on HBO Saturday, July 05, and on the streaming service a day earlier. The successful director of such works as Fruitvale Station(2013), Creed(2015), Black Panther(2018) and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever(2022) has assembled a cast including Michael B.Jordan in a dual role, Hailee Steinfeld, Miles Caton (in his film debut), Jack O’Connell, Wunmi Mosaku, Jayme Lawson, Omar Miller, and Delroy Lindo. Longtime Coogler collaborator Ludwig Göransson composed the film’s score and served as an executive producer. The film received critical acclaim and grossed $365.8 million worldwide, becoming one of the highest-grossing films of 2025.
Everyone is saying that it is a movie to see. SINNERS was projected to gross $30–40 million in its opening weekend. It went on to debut to $48 million, topping projections to finish first at the box office, and quickly became another success for Coogler.Our story? Well, in 1932, identical twins and World War I veterans Smoke and Stack Moore (Jordan) return to Clarksdale, Mississippi, after years spent working in Chicago. Using money stolen from gangsters, they purchase a sawmill from racist landowner Hogwood (David Maldonado) to start a juke joint for the local Black community. Their cousin Sammie (Caton), an aspiring guitarist, joins them despite his pastor father Jedidiah’s (Saul Williams) warnings that blues music is supernatural. It must be as Irish vampire Remmick (O’Connell) and his thralls pay a visit. A fight ensues in the juke joint, but who invites them inside, and more importantly, who survives and who gets bitten? If you haven’t seen this horror drama yet, you should. It is not really about surviving a vampire’s bite, but much more as it explores the power of music and the complexities of humanity, and is all told in a style and tone that makes it all so rich.
Seek out SINNERS on HBO and HBO Max.
