Louisiana-shot ‘Sinners’ movie wins 2 Golden Globe awards | Entertainment/Life

When presenter Kevin Hart opened the envelope for Best Cinematic and Box Office Achievement on Sunday night, it was the Louisiana-shot “Sinners” that walked away with the Golden Globe.

The man who wrote the screenplay and directed this film, Ryan Coogler, accepted the award for the box-office sensation.

“I just want to thank the audiences for showing up,” Coogler remarked. “This movie was made by hundreds of people, and although we’re all here tonight in tuxedos and glammed up, it was usually a grind making this movie.

“We were ordinarily in fishing gear in the swamps of Louisiana in the dog days of summer, and we told ourselves that one day this would have a theatrical release with thousands of people seeing it, so I want to say thank you again to everyone for turning out for this film.”

For Coogler, the initial spark that propelled him to write this film came from his Uncle James, who passed away in 2015, but who introduced him early on to blues artists and recordings. It was classics like Howlin’ Wolf’s “Wang Dang Doodle” that bonded the uncle and his nephew, and eventually this music would become the centerpiece for the story behind “Sinners.”

“I used blues as more than a backdrop, and often referenced other modern musicians like heavy metal Metallica because of the way in which some of their songs move emotionally from intensity to melody, then to chaos,” he told The Times-Picayune. “That pretty much represents the arc of the storyline in “Sinners.”

As to why Coogler paired blues history with vampire folklore, it all makes logical sense to the screenwriter/director. He noted that blues musicians historically told stories about selling their souls for musical gifts — hence, the perfect transition to bring the supernatural into the storyline.

Apparently, the idea for this film was percolating since he was in film school. A haunted guitar screenplay and a short western about outlaw brothers would become the backbone for the eventual “Sinners” screenplay.

For the artist who is best known for feature films like “Creed” and “Black Panther,” this was a big departure, exposing more of his own emotional world.

“The Delta Blues was an art form by people who were declaring their humanity, and that’s where the heart of this film lies,” Coogler said. “Whenever I would spend time with Uncle James, apart from drinking whiskey, he wanted to listen to old vinyl blues records. So, for me, it was like conjuring up his spirit after he died. I think he would have gotten a kick out of this film.”

Coogler is a collaborator and likes to work with the same group of people on his wide-ranging films. He and actor Michael B. Jordan have done numerous films together, among them 2013’s “Fruitvale Station,” 2015’s “Creed,” 2018’s “Black Panther,” 2022’s “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” and now 2025’s “Sinners.”

The same is true when it comes to his composer. He and Swedish musician Ludwig Göransson have worked together on the same five films, and Göransson won an Academy Award for Coogler’s “Black Panther,” not to mention a Golden Globe and an Oscar for Christopher Nolan’s Oscar-winning film, “Oppenheimer.” On Sunday night, he had to make space on his mantle for yet another award, the Golden Globe for Best Original Score for “Sinners.”

In an unprecedented move, the Golden Globes announced over the weekend that the award for Best Original Score would be cut from Sunday’s telecast, because of time constraints, but aired instead the award for a new category, Best Podcast. Multiple Oscar-winner Hans Zimmer (“Gladiator”) who was up against Göransson in this category, didn’t mince words about the unexpected snub.

“We are the psychological underbelly of the whole film,” Zimmer said.

Indeed, without Goransson’s musical score, “Sinners” would not have been the same film, simply because music was its underpinning, and an integral part of the vibe that the audience felt throughout this movie. Göransson stayed above the fray in his acceptance speech, which was seen only by people in the room at The Beverly Hilton Hotel, where the Globes are held.

“I feel grateful, Ryan Coogler, to be living in a timeline with you in it,” said Göransson. “You wrote a beautiful movie about a musician that made my life easy, as a composer. I was on-set for three months and was blown away by the amazing performances, particularly watching Michael B. Jordan play two different characters. That was just weird — but it’s a testament to him as an actor.”

To prepare for composing the music for “Sinners,” Göransson immersed himself in 1930’s Delta blues, studying records given to him by Coogler. Unlike most modern scores penned on keyboards or using digital tools, Göransson wrote most of “Sinners” on a 1932 Dobro resonator guitar, the same kind that was used in the film.

“I tracked down rare vintage Dobros from around the world and let the guitar’s unique sound shape the score’s texture, from slide playing and fingerpicking to an electric transformation later in the film’s dramatic arc,” Göransson explained. “I trained many of the actors on set to play musical instruments, and the most amazing was Miles Caton, who learned to play the guitar in just three and a half months.”

Goransson is currently finishing up the musical score for Christopher Nolan’s much-anticipated film, “The Odyssey,” while “Sinners” is being re-released theatrically on Jan. 22, the same day that Oscar nominations are announced. “Sinners” can currently be streamed on Amazon Prime Video.