"Sinners" is a vampire film set in the USA's Mississippi Delta in the 1930s, with Michael B Jordan in a dual role as twin brothers Smoke and Stack.
I wanted to do something supernatural, I pondered on different monsters and got stuck on vampires, says Coogler.
When the twin brothers on the run from their past return home, they take over an old barn and transform it into a primitive nightclub. But the party is interrupted when vampires appear. The more people get bitten, the more the number of vampires increases – and blood splatters in the film.
I loved it. I had made two films that were largely driven by digital effects. Now I could work practically, with effects that would be old school.
"Drenched in film blood"
Ryan Coogler has never worked that way before – and he believes that the audience will also notice the difference.
It was so much fun. I had never thought it would be so fun to be drenched in film blood.
But the vampires in "Sinners" differ slightly from other film vampires, he thinks.
They don't just see others as a source of food, but really want them to become part of the vampire society. Vampires retain parts of their personality and that makes them dangerous and scary, says Coogler and continues:
And they are sexy. Blues is a sexy music, it appeals to both body and soul. It was necessary for the film to be sexy.
Collaboration with the Swede
"Sinners" is a film based on music, and not least classical blues. The Swedish composer Ludwig Göransson, who Coogler has worked with on all his films, has made the original music.
Ludwig's dad is a blues musician, and that united us when we met at film school. I myself heard blues through my uncle who was obsessed with that music. After he died, I played his records and thought back on what he had told me, and it felt like he was there.
Ludwig and I sometimes communicate through our art. I communicate better through films than I do when I speak. And it's the same with music. Ludwig plays for me.
For Coogler, it was also important to show what conditions the blacks in the South lived under in the 1930s.
They lived in a society that was dehumanized when it came to them. They were stepped on, it happened then and it happens now. But they didn't give up, they continued to live, and that's what I'm glad about, otherwise I wouldn't be sitting here today.
Age: 38 years.
Family: Wife Zonzi, two daughters.
Lives: In Los Angeles.
Occupation: Screenwriter, director.
Previous films: "Fruitvale Station", "Creed", "Creed 2", "Black Panther", "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever"."
Currently with: "Sinners" which gets its Swedish cinema premiere on 16/4.
