It’s a symptom of the modern entertainment landscape that movies are now either commercially successful or critically acclaimed, but rarely both. Look over the highest-grossing films of 2025 and it’s a familiar roll call of sequels and spin-offs; look over the critics’ favourites and they are mostly fine movies that not enough people watched – all hoping for a boost from awards season. But Sinners ticked both boxes: it was a smash hit (the seventh highest grossing picture in the US and virtually the only original movie in the top 20), and it was a critical triumph (97% on Rotten Tomatoes, 84% on Metacritic). And most importantly of all, Sinners was a true original, combining action-horror excitement with deep, rich, personal storytelling. There’s nothing more gratifying than seeing a film-maker swing for the fences and actually knock it out of the park; against expectations, 39-year-old Ryan Coogler did just that.
