SINNERS *UPDATED*

I’ve come to the harsh realization that while Get Out is a movie I still enjoy – it has become more of a curse than anything else. I don’t know what it is but almost any prominent movie or television show to feature Black people dealing with issues concerning race and/or racism has to be analyzed through the lens of Get Out. It’s like a default setting. And the plots to a lot of these movies don’t do anything to shake this perception. Almost everything is some variation of “watch out for those white women” or “beware of the white boogeyman” or “watch out for those outsiders”. There are obviously a few exceptions but when you list everything off you’ll see that I’m right. Lovecraft Country, Them, Ma, Queen & Slim, Run Sweetheart Run, Opus, The Front Room, Tyrell, Master, Alice, Tales From The Hood Part 2, etc. They all have strands of Get Out’s DNA. Recently they put all nuance aside and made a psychological thriller called Karen about a racist white woman that terrorizes a Black couple. There are more cases but I think the 12 examples I just gave from the last five years alone proves my point. If not – perhaps you’re just a contrarian that wants to mindlessly disagree with everything. I’m well aware that movies like Dutchman, Murder In Harlem and Story Of A Three Day Pass existed decades prior. But filmmakers haven't taken from those movies like they've taken from Get Out.

I say all this because even though Sinners falls somewhere between Good/fine/entertaining (I personally found everything non-vampire related to be the most interesting), it still has the stench of "Get Out-sploitation". On one hand, it isn’t Ryan Coogler’s fault that everyone’s critique of this film is some insufferable super personalized think piece about race or the role of Black people in society or the so-called dangers of interracial relationships between Black men & White women (it's always only Black men and white women and never a critique on any other type of interracial relationship). It’s par for the course. Folks put a lot of weight on movies & television shows. For some reason a large sector of Black folks would rather seek validation about their Blackness from a movie or a TV show instead of real life. But at the same time – Coogler has to know that a movie with a predominately Black cast set in 1930’s Mississippi where a group of white vampires terrorize a Black establishment is going to bring on this type of dialogue. Outside of the basic premise which lies somewhere between Night Of The Living Dead and The Thing from Another World, Sinners has all the standard elements & themes I brought up earlier like; “beware of the white boogeyman” and “watch out for those white women”. 

Outside of the basic story about a group of characters trying to survive a vampire coup, Coogler made a genuine effort to touch on everything from the great migration to the history of Black Americans and their African roots. I don’t think everything was a success but I’m still glad I watched it on the big screen. Streaming Sinners at home won’t give you the same experience. I found some of the character’s decisions in the second half of the movie to be very stupid but I’ll give Ryan Coogler the benefit of the doubt on that. Perhaps he wanted to bring back that old school feeling of shouting at the screen when someone makes a stupid decision in a horror movie. I certainly found myself talking to the screen when someone does something dumb. This is clearly a movie that’s more than just a simple vampire movie so there is room for a deeper analysis. But reading through a lot of people’s tweets, tiktoks, letterboxd reviews and social media rants exposed that some folks needs to touch grass, go to therapy or do a combination of both. Good lord. You could argue that I'm giving too much attention to the opinions of people online. But if you think these aren't real life opinions then you're being naive....

*SPOILER* Mary & Stack proceed to stay together for 60+ years and counting but please tell me more about how they weren't together for a long time...

Notice the critique is just about Black men bringing white women into our spaces and nothing about Black women bringing white men into our spaces when the main villain in the film is in fact a white male vampire. God forbid...

 

And if you don’t want to go to therapy – watch more movies.

I’m happy that a filmmaker like Ryan Coogler remains successful but if there’s one thing that Sinners exposed it's that people need to watch more movies. You would have thought this was the first vampire movie ever. And if not Sinners, you would have thought that From Dusk Till Dawn was the first vampire movie to do what it did (…it wasn’t). For those that don't know, many people are saying that Sinners “stole” from From Dusk Till Dawn. 

@thestorytimeguy I love the movie Sinners but... its From Dusk Till Dawn #Sinners #fromdusktilldawn #vampires ♬ original sound - Matthew Torres

To that claim I will reemphasize that people need to watch more movies. From Dusk Till Dawn is a collage movie much like Pulp Fiction. It’s an homage to a handful of pre-existing genres. Last time I checked, the basic premise of Sinners is very similar to Ernest Dickerson’s Demon Knight (a movie released a year before From Dusk Till Dawn), which got it’s basic premise from George Romero’s Night Of The Living Dead (Dickerson worked under and learned from Romero before he became a director himself). Again – watch more movies before you decide to step out there and be loud & wrong.

Night Of The Living Dead / Sinners

Night Of The Living Dead /
Sinners

Demon Knight /
Sinners

Outside of Night Of The Living Dead by way of Demon Knight, Sinners also borrows from typical sources like The Shining

   

The Shining /
Sinners

And John Carpenter...

it's actually quite close to THE FACULTY, which is a remake of THE THING, which is one of my favorite movies. Definitely my favorite horror movie. So there's a lot of Carpenter in the film as well - Ryan Coogler

The Thing / Sinners

The Thing / Sinners

During Coogler's recent visit to the criterion closet he also namedropped Michael Mann's Thief as a another source of inspiration. Without spoiling too much - the endings to both films are pretty similar...

Thief / Sinners

Whatever criticisms I may have about Sinners really doesn’t matter. It’s a major success. My words won't sway any box office numbers (to be clear – I think this movie should be seen by as many people as possible). I just thought it would be nice to present a slightly more sane perspective on the movie.

GRAPHIC POLICY RADIO: BLACK PANTHER WAKANDA FOREVER

 

I made an appearance on Graphic Policy radio to talk about the latest Black Panther film and all the topics & subtopics that come along with it.

Click here or the image above to go to the episode.

Enjoy...

CREED

If you paid attention to the Rocky movies then you know Apollo Creed's personal life always played the background. His personality was so big that it distracted from everything else (plus he wasn't the main character so there wasn't any time to delve in to his life outside of the ring in addition to Rocky's). This adds an interesting quality to Creed as the character of "Adonis Creed" (Michael B. Jordan) was the product of a character who folks often forget had a life outside of boxing.
This is all afterthought however. I wasn't prepared to give this film the credit it deserves prior to seeing it. Like a lot of people, when the news of yet another Rocky movie started making waves I thought to myself: "...another one?!" But I knew even over a year ago when I first found out about this movie that I was going to see it no matter how skeptical I was.
What was it that drew me to Creed? Was it the Rocky franchise residue/nostalgia factor it carried (like a lot of 80's kids, I grew up watching the Rocky movies so much that it left a lasting impression on my movie brain)? Was it the well-cut trailer (other studio movies should take note on how to cut a proper movie trailer)? Perhaps I wanted it to be good because it was the sophomore feature of a young up & coming filmmaker (Ryan Coogler) that I want to see succeed. I also caught a recent screening of Fat City (probably one of the three greatest boxing movies of all time) so the genre is pretty fresh in my psyche at the moment and I have a greater appreciation for (good) boxing movies.
Maybe it was a combination of all of the above and more (I'm also a fan of Michael B. Jordan and I didn't want him to end the year with Fantastic Four being the last thing on his 2015 filmography).

I had a feeling Creed would be entertaining but I didn't expect it to be this well-made. Sure the film plays on cliche storylines like the role of the father figure, the idea of "passing the torch", and Sylvester Stallone's Rocky Balboa making the transition from boxer to trainer, which is really what Rocky 5 should have been (not only is Stallone the same age as Burgess Meredith was when he first took on the role of Mickey, but there's a middle section in Creed that kind of plays out just like an important moment in Rocky 3).

But sometimes it doesn't matter how cliche something is but rather how well it's executed. And Creed was executed quite well. The premise is simple & straightforward (Apollo Creed's illegitimate son seeks out Rocky Balboa to train him to be a better fighter), the performances are solid (Stallone did a lowkey great job), the pacing of the movie is good, and Coogler makes Creed its own (somewhat) separate entity. ...Kind of. The look, feel, music & all around ambiance is different from all the other Rocky movies with the exception of maybe Rocky Balboa. There has to be some sort of a tie-in/connection with the Rocky franchise and Ryan Coogler definitely does that. Not only do certain key moments in Creed play off of key moments in Rocky 1, but the final fight between Adonis Creed & opponent Ricky Conlan is right out of Rocky 4.
But at the same time, when Sylvester Stallone isn't on camera you sometimes forget you're watching a Rocky movie.

And as cliche as Creed is at times, it also doesn't give any false or blind hope in parts where you think things are going to magically work out. In one scene early on in the film Adonis gets his ass handed to him in the ring just after acting brash & confident like his father. And in the final fight, Creed's walk out to the ring isn't very triumphant or even that adrenaline pumping. Instead, he approaches the ring with caution and a little bit of fear (I appreciate Creed's honesty in moments like this because boxers are incredibly vulnerable at times no matter how tough they are).

I guess my only issue with Creed is that the title character's rise & popularity in the boxing world happens way too fast (almost like Jamie Foxx's Willie Beamen in Any Given Sunday). Legacy or not, you don't get a title shot as fast as he did. But that's really nitpicking on my part. That kind of stuff is to be expected in a movie like this so it really isn't that big of a deal (on a sillier note, I wonder why Carl Weathers didn't make a ghostly cameo like he did in Happy Gilmore).

The cinematography, courtesy of Maryse Alberti (Poison, Velvet Goldmine, The Wrestler, etc), deserves its own separate write-up. It's the perfect combination of flashiness & technical prowess (almost like a good boxer). It may take some of you minutes to even catch on that a lot of the fight scenes in Creed are done in one fluid shot without any breaks (Maryse definitely upped her in-ring camera work since The Wrestler).
But again - if you paid attention the Rocky movie then you know great cinematography is nothing new to the franchise (the first Rocky film is always noted for its Steadicam usage).

Creed successfully bridged a new era of fresh Rocky content with the old classic material. Instead of trying to desperately squeeze out the last bit of nostalgia from the old Rocky, Ryan Coogler set up a whole new potential franchise that can pretty much stand on it's own (with a few callbacks here & there). I only hope younger folks who aren't familiar with the older films will seek them out (leaving the theater I seriously overhead one young girl ask her boyfriend "soooo who was Apollo Creed? Like, some guy who died?" So yeah, we have some work to do). At the end of the day Creed had no business being as good as it turned out and is definitely a top 10 contender for 2015.

A SPECIAL READING OF DO THE RIGHT THING AT THE LINCOLN CENTER

This past Monday I was at a screening of Andrei Tarkovsky's The Sacrifice at the Brooklyn Academy Of Music with my friend Mtume Gant when he got a text from Newlyweeds director Shaka King about reading for the role of "Buggin' Out" in some kind of special intimate reading of Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing at The Lincoln Center. As it turned out, Shaka & Fruitvale Station director Ryan Coogler, in conjunction with the activist organization; Blackout For Human Rights, were organizing/curating a free screenplay reading of Lee's original script as a way to raise awareness towards some recent high profile humans rights violations caused by public servants/police officers (the choking death of Eric Garner, the shooting of both Oscar Grant & Mike Brown, etc) and to counter the madness of "Black Friday".

On a side note - this Black Friday nonsense is not a good look for Americans. I'll be the first to admit that I can't stand when other countries criticize America/Americans (unless your Canadian or Icelandic, you really have no right to criticize what any country does even if your current track record is OK at the moment. Just sayin'...)

But no other country acts as ridiculous as we do when it comes to consumerism. It's gotten to the point where all the craziness associated with Black Friday (riots, fights, deaths, lining up outside a store in the cold weather at 12am to get a good price on a TV or a blender) has reached the news in other countries, and they're laughing at us. I was in Paris a few years ago and some of my Parisian friends were inquiring about Black Friday with these smirks on their faces almost as if they were saying; "you dummies".
...strangely enough, everyone who attended this reading of Do The Right Thing (myself included) did have to wait outside in the cold for a while in order to get in. But the event was free and more than worth it. Not to sound dramatic but it was a once in a lifetime opportunity for both cinephiles & socially conscious folk that are fed up with what's going on in the world today (especially in the U.S.)

And in my opinion, it's much better to wait 90 minutes out in the cold for something like this instead of waiting for a flat screen TV that'll break in a few years...

The intimate reading of DTRT last night was many things. It was yet another deserved (and possibly the most unique) celebration of the 25th anniversary of Spike Lee's film (I'm privileged to have personally attended two of three 25th anniversary events for DTRT here in NYC); it was a mini reunion in that some of the original cast members (John Turturro, Frankie Faizon & Joie Lee) were able to come together again, and, as I already noted, it was an appropriately timed event with all that's been going on concerning police brutality & gun violence in America these days.

Throughout this special raw, lively, rehearsal-like reading of Spike Lee's original script, there were photos & images of recent protests concerning everyone from Oscar Grant up to Mike Brown projected on a large screen behind the actors.

Last night was also a bit of a torch passing on Lee's part as the reading was co-curated/directed by two of the few young/up & coming American filmmakers of color working today (Coogler & King). In fact, many of the actors they've worked with were featured in the reading playing various roles (Michael B. Jordan, Trae Harris, Tone Tank, Melanie Diaz, etc). 

Although Spike Lee couldn't be in attendance, he sent along a personal message/dedication for Ruby Dee, Ossie Davis & Danny Aiello Jr.

At this point, I'm sure most people reading this have seen Spike Lee's groundbreaking film. And even if you haven't seen it, I'm sure you've seen it referenced everywhere in mainstream pop culture in the last 25 years from outlets ranging from The Simpsons & SNL to the films of Kevin Smith. But this scripted version of Do The Right Thing had a few slight differences from the movie version - certain lines were changed and/or removed, some scenes were added, and the famous climactic riot at the end had a slightly different outcome. 

The roles of Mookie (Spike Lee) & Tina (Rosie Perez) were played by Michael B. Jordan & Melanie Diaz, respectfully. Turturro & Joie Lee portrayed the roles of Sal (Danny Aiello Sr.) & Mother-Sister (Ruby Dee). Mtume Gant & comedian Godfrey read for the roles of Buggin' Out (Giancarlo Esposito) & Mister Señior Love Daddy (Samuel L. Jackson), while a slew of other actors (Gbenga Akinnagbe, Trae Harris, Tone Tank, etc) wore multiple hats portraying various roles throughout the screening (original cast member Frankie Faizon was the only actor to reprise his original role).

For a cold reading (some of the actors who participated in this event never even met prior to it), this thing went off incredibly smooth and the (privileged) audience fully enjoyed themselves. It was almost like getting an inside look at the pre-production/rehearsal/workshopping process that goes in to filmmaking & acting.

As a person of color/cinephile/film critic/somewhat socially conscious person I couldn't think of a better way to spend a post-thanksgiving evening (I'm not even sure if the reading was even filmed which makes this even more special in this viral/instant world we live in)

A FEW WORDS ON FRUITVALE STATION...

In the mid/late 80's there was a string of films made about the atrocities that were going on in South Africa at the time (Cry Freedom, A Dry White Season, Mandela, etc) that my father would avoid because he couldn’t stomach all the scenes of Africans being beaten & murdered. At the time I use to think he was being dramatic when he'd leave the room whenever one of those movies would come on cable but now that I'm older I get where he was coming from with the release of Fruitvale Station. The silent generation had Rosewood (and countless other lynchings), Baby Boomers had Emmitt Till (and, like Rosewood, a ton of other cases just like it), Generation X had Rodney King and Generation Y, my generation, had Oscar Grant & Trayvon Martin. Given that the release of Fruitvale Station coincided with the Trayvon Martin aftermath, I wasn't in the right mindset to rush out and see this as there were some pretty fresh wounds that weren't healed yet with George Zimmerman being found not guilty. Say what you want about how you knew Zimmerman was gonna get off but I honestly thought SOME kind of justice would be served.

My initial reason for not wanting to see Fruitvale Station is because I already saw the real video from many different points of view on the internet. Why see a drawn out movie version of something when I already saw the real thing? All that's gonna do is piss me of again regardless if the film is good or not. Actually it would have pissed me off twice as much if Fruitvale Station was bad, which it isn’t. Fruitvale Station is hardly bad but it’s far from great. It’s certainly powerful but in an uneven kind of way. 

Even now I almost don’t wanna write about this film because I have a criticism of it (which I'll get in to shortly) and I honestly fear (some) people can’t disassociate Oscar Grant, the real person, from the movie and will think I'm criticizing him. 

Another reason I didn’t wanna write about this film has to do with my own insecurities partially due to the expectations some people may have on a guy like me (on three occasions, before I actually saw Fruitvale Station, I was asked what I thought about it instead of being asked if I'd seen it in the same way customers at the video store I use to work at would automatically ask me what I thought about the latest Tyler Perry release or whatever film that happened to be out at the time that co-starred Cedric The Entertainer and/or Anthony Anderson). It's in the same vein as that assumption, made equally by both black people & white people, that Spike Lee is automatically my favorite director because I'm black and he's black. I genuinely don’t wanna be the black guy who writes about "black movies". Why do you think I avoid writing about Spike Lee so much on here? Because in a way, it’s expected of me. 

But at the end of the day I can’t let that stuff stop me from watching & writing about a film that everyone is talking about on a site that a descent amount of people read...

I feared Fruitvale Station would fall victim to portraying the protagonist out to be some kind of realistic/believable saint out of fear of judgment from ignorant fox news watching, Rush Limbaugh listening, Ted Nugent loving conservatives who went out of their way to make Oscar Grant out to be a good for nothing thug (which is their way of saying he got what he deserved). As I assumed, the majority of Fruitvale Station fell in to that trap. Conservatives, racists and other Oscar Grant detractors aren't gonna be swayed by this film. All you needed to do was watch the coverage on Fox news leading up to the release of Fruitvale Station to see they already judged/hated it before they saw it so why indirectly cater to them and essentially try to prove something to that crowd? 

I'm not saying Director Ryan Coogler did this intentionally but its written all over the tone of the film.

In the first hour of Fruitvale Station Grant, played by Chronicle co-star Michael B. Jordan, helps a dog off the street that’s been hit by a car, gets his grandmother to give cooking lessons to woman over the phone, decides he's gonna stop selling drugs and dumps $1,000 dollars worth of weed in to the ocean to prove to himself he really means it. Coogler still makes it a point to show Grant's faults & short comings in life - he cheated on his girlfriend, he lies & has a temper but at the end of the day that stuff is overshadowed by all the good stuff he does in a matter of a few hours. I don’t know if those events happened or not because I wasn’t there but in all honesty, it didn’t really fascinate me. What fascinates me is how someone could be face down, handcuffed, surrounded by three cops and still get shot (only to have the cop who shot Grant get out of prison after 11 months). Apparently the BART cop who shot Oscar Grant mistook his real gun for his taser gun. It's scary to think that there's trusted officers of the law in existence who mistake a taser gun for a real gun (and I personally don’t care what kind of pressure he/she may be under. There's training for that as far as I'm concerned).

Understand that part of my criticism comes from personal preference. I understand the choice to focus on the last 24 hours of Grant's life. Generally speaking, we all fall in to that groove of a daily routine and usually take 24 hour periods for granted. The last thing we expect is to get murdered. So narrowing the subject's life down to his final day where he does a bunch of small yet meaningful acts makes sense when I take a step back and look at the film from a far.

But at the same time, Oscar Grant coulda laid around for the last 24 hours of his life and scratched his nuts for all I care. He was still executed (accidentally or not) and the whole world saw it on the Internet yet no real justice was served. Not to take anything from Jordan & Octavia Spencer, who were both great, and call me cliche, but Fruitvale Station would have possibly been a more effective documentary. 

Oscar Grant's murder may have been the first injustice of that magnitude to be "embraced" & spread through social media.

Ironically, the same people who screamed about justice for Oscar Grant on MySpace & Facebook could have cared less the day of his murderers sentencing as they were more enthralled by Lebron James' decision to go play for the Miami Heat which was happening at the exact same time...

But no matter how flawed I may think it is, Fruitvale Station is still getting tons of praise and positive feedback which is a great thing no matter what. The film's heart is in the right place (which is an understatement) and the last 30 minutes is very effective/powerful. The last third of the film is what really intrigued me. Had Fruitvale Station only been the last 30 minutes it would have been an almost flawless short. I appreciate that a film like Fruitvale Station is getting so much attention & praise (or was even given the green light to be made!) with a cast made up of unknowns, traditionally supporting players (Kevin Durand & Octavia Spencer) and young/up & coming actors like; Michael B. Jordan & Melanie Diaz (thankfully Anthony Mackie & Rosario Dawson, who are both great, are in their mid-30's now and couldn’t be predictably cast in this). 

I also find comfort in the fact that the director of this film is a young male of color around the same age that Oscar Grant would have been if he was alive today.