Ryan Coogler Really Wants You To See Sinners On The Big Screen – And You Should

It’s just like we’re always saying: we want more original movies. Big, splashy genre ones, movie-movies. Like Harry Styles would say, a moooovie. Released on the big screen, driving audiences out in force for Friday night thrills, whilst also giving us something bold and new and unexpected. All signs point to Ryan Coogler’s Sinners being such a feat. At its core, it’s a vampire horror film, perfect for popcornery, brought to us by one of the most exciting filmmakers working today, who has consistently knocked it out of the park on Fruitvale Stationand Creed and Black Panther. Plus, there’s a major leading man in Michael B. Jordan, pulling double duty as identical twin gangsters. Most importantly, Sinners isn’t based on any existing IP. It’s a true Coogler original, top to bottom.

In support of his film, out this week, Coogler has delivered one of the coolest pieces of movie promo in many a year. It’s a video that’s, ostensibly, a film format breakdown – a 10-plus minute explainer on the many different cinematic presentations that Sinners will receive when it hits the big screen on Friday, from digital projection, to film, to IMAX and more. But really, the video – released on Kodak’s YouTube channel – is a mini film school, an illumination on different film stocks, aspect ratios, cinematic exhibition. It subtly gets to the very building blocks of cinema – how images are captured, and framed, and why that’s important, and how it translates into what you see on screen. Coogler is an open and generous host, clearly a film geek as much as a movie geek. It’s clear: this matters to him.

"It’s also up to audiences to lean forward a bit more, and create the blockbuster landscape they want to see."

As a result, it now matters to us too. Letting us in – the film fans, the general audience – gives us an opportunity to decide how we want to see Sinners. It’s clear that Coogler is no snob; whichever format you choose is up to you, whether it’s simply down your local multiplex from a DCP, or in chair-shaking 4DX, or on ultra-rare 15-perf projected IMAX, only available at 10 sites around the world. But peeling back the curtain on the work that went into capturing Sinners – to reiterate, a true original, from a modern great, with a relatively hefty budget – on multiple formats gives us an investment into seeing the film large and loud.

That’s how it should be. A fresh Coogler is appointment opening weekend viewing, much in the same vein as a new Christopher Nolan, or Jordan Peele, or Greta Gerwig. This is where the spirit of ‘Barbenheimer’ was meant to lead us. And while the average person on the street is unlikely to watch a 10-minute explainer on film stocks, Coogler’s Kodak video exists in perpetuity as an open invitation to engage – with the notion of Sinners as destination cinema; with the value of art in an entertainment landscape where media can seem throwaway; with what it might mean to shoot your own movie on one of these film stocks. Anyone watching Coogler’s explanation of film would struggle to say they were less invested by the end of it. Sure, it’s up to artists to create work that energises audiences into leaving their homes; but it’s also up to audiences to lean forward a bit more, and create the blockbuster landscape they want to see.

This is the stuff that matters – the history of the medium, the future of film, the sharing of knowledge from masters of the form. And ripping new vampire flicks. As a result, I plan to see Sinners multiple times – first up, in whatever format I can find near me, simply to see the film for all those thrills and spills, and that Ludwig Göransson soundtrack. But you bet I’ll be tracking down one of those elusive 15-perf film-projected 70mm IMAX presentations as soon as I can. If Coogler cares this much, then I do too.