“Sinners” - Pretty good-ish.

One moment, Selma Hayek is doing a seductive dance in her underwear while wielding a large snake, George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino looking on. The next moment, she is a b-movie vampire attacking the strip club’s patrons. It’s a very jarring shift, instantly transitioning from an intriguing crime drama to another of director Robert Rodriguez’s horror pulp fetishes. From Dusk Till Dawn made us wonder if Rodriguez had been drinking the fake movie blood from his sets. The new film Sinners, from director Ryan Coogler, performs a similar transition, though not so terribly executed.

To be sure, Sinners is a far superior film to From Dusk Till Dawn, including when it turns into a survive-the-monsters movie. Sinners doesn’t completely hide the monster element like Dawn does. Sinners begins with opening narration – notably as unnecessary as all opening narration – talking about how music can link eras and generations at a supernatural level. This is followed by a scene depicting a young man named Sammie (Miles Caton) walking into his father’s small church, covered in blood and clutching the neck of his destroyed guitar, interspersed with flashes of a grisly night featuring something demonic.

Then, the movie cuts to twenty-four hours earlier and the supernatural is all but forgotten for the next hour-ish of the film. Twin brothers Smoke and Stack (both played by Michael B. Jordan) left home to fight in World War I, spent some years in Chicago working for Al Capone, and have now returned to their home. Together, they plan to open a juke joint (nightclub and speakeasy) to serve the local sharecroppers. For that first hour-ish, the movie meticulously develops multiple characters and various relationships, including a brief mention of the Ku Klux Klan when Smoke and Stack purchase land from the local white mayor.

The highlight of all of this development is the group of characters Smoke and Stack assemble to staff their juke joint for that night’s grand opening. In addition to Sammie are Annie (Wunmi Mosaku) to cook the food, Grace (Li Jun Li) and Bo (Yao) Chow to tend bar, Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo) to play piano, Cornbread (Omar Benson Miller) to bounce the door, and, of course, Sammie to play guitar. Each character brings a unique element to the situation and all of them have a history with the twins. In addition to the staff are two vixens in Mary (Hailee Steinfeld) and Pearline (Jayme Lawson), both married, but both discarding their vows for at least the night.

For that first hour-ish, there is all sorts of intrigue in the air. Everyone in town knows the twins and their mob-linked reputations from their time in Chicago. Where did they get all that Irish beer, Italian wine, and satchels of cash? And what of the local Klansmen, whom the mayor claims no longer exist *wink wink*? Are there two different gangs looking for the twins? Then there are the ladies, particularly the two with the unseen husbands. What kind of trouble do they bring to the foray? On top of all that, we still have that whole thing about music and the supernatural. Lest you forget about it, there’s a scene with Stack and Sammie that practically smacks you in the face with it. I can’t stress enough how truly engaging this entire hour-ish is and it’s a shame we live in the timeline where the second half of this movie takes a hard right turn onto a very different road.

That’s not to say the second half isn’t also good. Unlike From Dusk Till Dawn, Sinners doesn’t immediately become a trashy survive-until-dawn vampire flick. Instead, Sinners eases the audience into a quality survive-until-dawn vampire flick. Yes, it gets pretty bonkers, including plenty of blood and gore. But it also has some really good scenes mixed in. Some really, really good scenes, particularly two featuring some fantastic music, choreography, and imagery. And the performances from the actors only get better (they were quite good during the first half), serving to elevate every scene.

The flaw in the film is that it discards nearly all of the first half’s build up by making the vampires entirely new characters. I don’t fault the movie for steering that direction, but why didn’t they make the Klan guys the vampires? That would have tied everything together nicely, commenting on the very nature of the Jim Crow South and the Klan being vampirish, both figuratively and literally. That missed opportunity seems almost like Coogler pulled his punch.

The film also whiffs a smidge by not bringing the music angle all the way back around. There are hints throughout, even that the head vampire Remmick (Jack O’Connell) is supernaturally drawn to Sammie through Sammie’s music. It might seem like a small nit, but I would have liked just one or two more quick scenes, or even just sentences, from Remmick to tie it all together. I really would like to visit that other timeline.

But it’s really difficult not to like the movie we got in this timeline. From the acting, to the visuals, to the music, to some tongue-in-cheek vampire lore (a garlic test and playing up that vampires must be invited in, to name two examples), to some surprisingly spicy erotic scenes, to some very good cinematography, to very good action scenes - there’s a little something for everyone, even the horror pulp fans.

Rating: Ask for two dollars-ish back.

“Without Remorse” - Until you watch this film.

While we continue to wait for theaters to reopen with movies we actually want to pay for, streaming services are still pumping out plenty of content for us to chew on. Three weeks ago, Without Remorse dropped on Amazon Prime and I finally found some time to sneak it in. And I was looking forward to it. Amazon’s Jack Ryan series has been solid, and Tom Clancy movies are typically fun, twisty, intrigue-filled, action thrillers worth watching at least once. Unfortunately, Without Remorse has a disadvantage the other Clancy films lacked - no Jack Ryan. As hurdles go, Without Remorse ran face first into it.

(Very mild SPOILER ALERT - If we had to actually pay for this, I’d really be spoiling this clunker.)

The film starts out in typical soldier movie fashion with Kelly leading a team tasked with rescuing a hostage in Aleppo, Syria, as part of a joint CIA operation. Our new Tom Clancy lead is Navy SEAL Senior Chief John Kelly (Michael B. Jordan), who has all the charisma of a kitchen sink. During the mission briefing, Kelly says “Wow. That was a good talk.” CIA agent Robert Ritter (Jamie Bell) responds with “You a comedian? Is that it?” Another SEAL responds with another dud of a retort and we’ve just witnessed a bunch of actors proving why they were cast in a dead-serious action flick and not a comedy. Especially Jordan, but we’ll come back to that later.

During the mission, Kelly discovers that the soldiers holding the hostage are not Syrian, but Russian, and this is supposed to be some big revelation. It was an open secret that both the United States and Russia had troops on the ground in Syria. So, why doesn’t Ritter just tell them? It’s not like the Navy SEALS are under the impression that Russia is just there for the nightlife. Because CIA. If Ritter told them he’d have to kill them. Right, Hollywood?

Fast forward three months and our SEALS are enjoying not being on a mission. Suddenly, Russian assassins are everywhere, killing the SEALS in revenge. Kelly manages to survive several gunshot wounds, but his pregnant wife Pam (Lauren London) is gunned down in her sleep before Kelly is able to kill all but one of the assassins in his home. After recovering, Kelly’s only goal left in life is to hunt down the escaped assassin to avenge his family’s death. Unlike Wrath of Man and John Wick, this movie isn’t putting the viewer into a fantastical mob or hitman landscape that at least have inklings of creativity to keep the viewer engaged. Kelly is just a blunt instrument sent on his way by his commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander Greer (Jodie Turner-Smith) who has the gall to be upset that Kelly goes on a murder spree and ends up having to get him out of prison. If this were a stupid 80’s action flick (and let’s be honest, it is), Greer definitely checks the box for this movie having a stupid chief.

Meanwhile, Secretary of Defense Thomas Clay (Guy Pearce) wants to send Russia a message that killing American soldiers on American soil is a no-no. During Kelly’s murder spree, Kelly acquired the name of the escaped assassin and Clay greenlights a mission to track down the assassin and kill him. To recap the plot of this movie so far, it’s: hostage rescue and dead Russians, revenge, revenge, revenge. This is followed by a reveal that makes zero sense, followed by the final reveal that makes the first reveal somehow even more nonsensical (plus, the motivation explaining it is mind-numbingly banal), followed by more revenge. It wouldn’t be so bad if it at least featured amazing choreography or wasn’t dripping in wildly outdated political Cold War intrigue.

Speaking of which, I am not seeing what other people see in Jordan. I was not impressed with his performances in Creed or Black Panther (or Fahrenheit 451, for that matter) and his performance as Kelly did nothing to change my mind. Not that the script did him any favors. There is an attempt to make him seem like a thinker early in the film. Once when he discovers the Russian soldiers by looking at the cell phone of one of the dead soldiers and later when he is walking by his kids playing chess and stops to make a move for one of the kids. Oh, and since I have the power to pause this movie, I rewatched the move he made and it wasn’t even legal! He moved a bishop like it was a knight. Not only is he the asshole who butted into a game of chess (which would get said person stabbed with a pawn), but he doesn’t even know how to play chess. No wonder the idiot’s revenge plan included ramming a car in the departures area of Dulles, then setting the car on fire, all while dozens of people watched (and in real life, would have captured the video of on their phones).

Despite all that, this film might have been tolerable had Jordan shown the slightest amount of interest in his character. Jordan’s Kelly is a flat, boring character with whom you sympathize only by default, due to his dead wife. The only point in the movie where his character comes to life is when he fights off a bunch of prison guards in his cell. And don’t think I’m letting the rest of the cast off the hook. Turner-Smith somehow manages negative charisma, Pearce seems just as confused by the plot and his lines as the audience is, and Bell is clearly trying to convince us that Ritter is not trustworthy purely because CIA. Turns out London was the only winner since all she had to do was die in her sleep as pregnant Pam. And I do mean only winner because running into that hurdle hurts.

Rating: You didn’t pay for this movie and you should still ask for eight dollars back.