It is rare for a horror movie to have critics raving about it and Black folks jumping on social media to advocate for it...but that’s exactly what’s going down with “Sinners. The movie made over $40 million in its opening weekend…which is no small thing for an R-rated film. “Sinners” has a lot on its mind, but there is one short scene in the middle of the movie that has us intrigued.
When we first see the head vampire Remmick, he is bad shape. Dude is running for his undead life. He has clearly been through something because his face is disfigured and his skin is smoking more than pot of boiling water. Something or someone has him shook...so much, in fact, that he took off while the sun was up to get away from it.
What has Remmick so terrified that he ran to the home of a white supremacist family (a group of people that he clearly has disdain for) to get away from it? Choctaw vampire hunters.
I need a film, a book, or…hell, I’d take an Instagram reel...about what led to Remmick crossing paths with the Choctaw. I want to know how they discovered what he was. And, more importantly, what they did to him that shook him to his core. Because that man was out on those dirt roads running.
It is clear they understood vampires. The Choctaw hunters knew not to invite a vampire into your home. They clearly knew how to hurt the beings. And when the sun went down, they did not waste any time...they left immediately.
I don’t think this is a mistake. Earlier in the film, Coogler mentions that the Choctaw, like Black folks and the Irish, have a special relationship with music. Sammie is a uniquely gifted musician, and it is his talent that attracted the vampires to The Juke. Therefore, the implication is that something drew Remmick to the Choctaws…and they made him pay for knocking on the door.
I’m not alone. Black folks on social media saw what I saw and they want to know more about what led to that scene in the film.
Coogler clearly is thinking franchise. The mid-credits scene shows us that there is more story to tell. I just want him to start with the Choctaws. Clearly they are the Abraham Van Helsings of the “Sinners” universe.