Nicole Huff
The newest addition to our current Black Horror Renaissance comes from none other than Ryan Coogler in his vampire horror debut Sinners. As a Black person from the South, I was in awe of how Coogler portrays the Jim Crow South as still full of Black hope and joy despite its cotton-field-filled backdrops. And, as an Afrofuturist, it was these themes of liberation and unmitigated joy that drew me in.
Already I’ve seen commentary on Sinners negating its status as a horror movie. Even Spike Lee has stated that this is a “new genre” rather than a horror film. But I want to reiterate that this, amidst all its historical exploration of the Black South, is a horror film. In fact, it’s a particular horror film— a vampire film! The tendency to label this film anything other than horror I believe stems from a long history of Black art and literature needing to legitimize itself and prove itself worthy thus rejecting genres and mediums that have been effectively ghettoized. Why would we associate ourselves with a ghettoized genre like horror? Well, that’s exactly what Coogler, and many other Black artists, have done as there is a potential within horror and especially in Black Horror and that potential lies in the hopefulness embedded in the genre.
