‘Sinners’ brings fresh attention to a Delta town’s mythical legacy, future and culture

Clarksdale, where ‘Sinners’ is set, is a small city that has been glowing ever since Hollywood came to town recently to provide free screenings of the movie. Clarksdalians are hopeful the nationwide attention will give new life to a place renowned for its blues, culture and supernatural myths.   

But why did Clarksdale need a screening?

In ‘Sinners,’ the lore of the town is woven into the fabric of the film’s storyline. Twins ‘Smoke’ and ‘Stack,’ both played by Michael B. Jordan, arrive back in the Delta after time in Chicago, a city that is pointed out to be nothing more than “Mississippi with tall buildings.”

The lush, vibrant life of 1930’s era Clarksdale is explored as the film opens. The audience is transported between cotton fields, church sanctuaries and, perhaps in a nod to local blues legend Robert Johnson, the crossroads of a railroad station and a juke joint. 

So many elements of Clarksdale’s traditional culture appeared in ‘Sinners,’ it seemed obvious that residents of the city would have their interests piqued enough to attend showings of the film in theaters. Yet, Clarksdale native Chloe Dorsey says initially, that was just not possible initially.

“Just really accessibility,” she said. “I didn't want to drive an hour and a half, two hours away to go to a theater. I have things to do here and I just couldn't take the time out of my schedule to go and just drive and spend like four hours in a movie theater.”

Clarksdale has not had a movie theater in over 20 years.

Jaleesa Collins, an author from Clarksdale, saw the movie in another town and said she was moved by the cultural familiarity she felt throughout the film. Something had to be done. 

“The idea came actually from myself,” she said. “I'm part of the Clarksdale committee. I made a post on Facebook to a lot of local organizers, community leaders, and the committee that I serve on.”

Inspired by the growing conversation around the idea on social media, Clarksdale native Tyler Yarbrough decided to pen an open letter to the people behind the movie.

“I just wrote an open letter and just invited them, Ryan Coogler, Michael B. Jordan, the cast and crew, executives at Warner Brothers, to come experience the Delta. Touch our ancestral soil, experience our juke joints, our museums, and be in conversations with us,” he said. “And also do a public screening.”

These ideas picked up steam after journalist Aallyah Wright profiled Yarbrough and Collins’s efforts to bring ‘Sinners’ to Clarksdale. 

“It just went viral, like, just happened very, very quick,” Yarbrough said. “Within two days, we were talking to top executives at Warner Brothers. Apparently, it was Ryan Coogler. He saw it the next day and told the top execs, let's make this happen.”

Clarksdale Culture Capital came together in just a few weeks: a three-day event featuring six screenings of ‘Sinners’ alongside curated panel discussions that dove deep into what should come next for Clarksdale. 

While waiting for the first screening of the film to start in the Clarksdale Civic Auditorium, Catherine Clark of Clarksdale was beaming.

“I am elated,” she said. “I want Clarksdale on the map in a positive way. In the past years, we're always in the light for negative stuff. This is nice. Maybe it'll open people's eyes and bring more attention to Clarksale positively.”  

Attendees of the first two screenings were treated to special guests: ‘Sinners’ director, Ryan Coogler, actor Miles Caton, composer Ludwig Göransson, as well as Coogler’s wife and co-producer, Zinzi.

Speaking to the audience, Coogler says one of his uncles and a grandfather came from Mississippi before moving to California.

“I had never been here until working on the script,” he said. “Coming here, it blew my mind. I got to meet musicians, I got to meet community members, business owners. It really changed me just to come here and do the research.”

Zinzi says they felt the urgency of the moment.

“We heard the call that there isn't a theater for the local community,” she said. “We said, wait, wait, wait. We will show up.”

Close to 1,500 residents, visitors from other parts of the Delta, Tennessee and Arkansas settled in and were thrilled by the horror movie, clapping and screaming joyously when “Clarksdale, Mississippi, October 15, 1932” came across the screen.

Joyce Kingdom, who drove just over an hour from Greenville to watch the movie, says ‘Sinners’ felt like the Delta. 

“All of the voodoo, you know, the spirits, definitely number one, the blues, and as well as the roots of the young lady having to know how to conjure the voodoo, bad spirits and stuff,” she said. “It definitely felt like home, most definitely.”

That feeling of home is what Yarbrough, who initially wrote the open letter to bring the film to Clarksdale, was hoping for.

“I'm still processing it,” he said. “I think a lot’s going to come out of it. We got so many pictures and video with it. But, in Clarksdale particularly, we got to shake people a little bit. Like what's possible, what's real, what's tangible, what's happening right now. So we can really try to chart our future.”

Yarbrough is the director of the Mississippi Delta Program for the Partnership for a Healthy America. Becoming emotional, he describes taking ‘Sinners’ director, Coogler, on a tour of Clarksdale, including a new grocery store and a farm.

“Ryan was able to walk on that land, to hear the stories, to put his hands in the water,” Yarbrough said. “It was magical. They pretty much did everything that we requested in that open letter.”

Clarksdale is a town where 40 percent of people live in poverty. Since there has not been a local movie theater for so many years, the basics of a screening had to be worked out. A screen and projector were driven about 20 hours from New York. Sound, rigging and drapery were all sourced from local vendors in Mississippi. 

Justin Hardiman is a photographer from Jackson who oversaw photography and media for the Clarksdale movie event. He’s previously done a photo series depicting residents of the Delta.

“I see a lot of similarities within the film versus what I've done and stuff like that” he said. “I feel like it's all in the same universe if you think about it like that. I thought the film was beautiful. I give it a nine out of ten, and just a nine out of ten because I don't think anything is perfect. But I think with the imperfections that you have within art, that's what makes it the art.”

He believes ‘Sinners’ can open doors to expand people’s understanding of the Delta.

“I don't really want to say where he could have dived into cause he could've dived into a lot of stuff, but it's a movie too,” he said. “It's three hours. You can't really say a whole lot with a movie, but I will say, it's lot of opportunity there for other people to do spin-offs of that.  Or do their own rendition, or do their own photo shoots.”

Jermeria Skillom, who was born in Clarksdale and helped organize the screenings, says the movie has increased her pride in being from the Delta.   

“I'm not just living here because I'm from here,” she said. “I'm living here because there's a purpose. There's things happening, particularly in the Delta.”

Skillom hopes she and her city will experience a renaissance of Clarkdale’s cultural legacy. 

“It feels like I’m a part of a team, a part of some upper mobility,” she said. “It feels like that third wave. Like the first wave was coming out of slavery into sharecropping. The second wave was coming out of sharecropping. This third wave is like a generation of people being genuinely proud of being from Mississippi and trying to switch the stereotype.”

Brittany Ivy from Clarksdale, also wants the reputation of Clarksdale to change.

“I understand the stereotypes and all of that about it here and there,” she said. “It's still very much present, as far as like a lot of the racial tension and the segregation. But still, a great community of people here. We really don't fixate on those type of issues when we’re out and about.”

Rebekah Pleasant-Patterson, who is the executive director of Griot Arts in Clarksdale, emphasizes that the residents of the city had already set the stage for Clarksdale to catch the world’s eye. 

“We have to understand that ‘Sinners’ chose us,” she said. “We didn't choose ‘Sinners.’ I think that's really important to understand because we are the stars of the story.” 

The film's director, Ryan Coogler, has said he initially wanted to shoot the film in Mississippi, but the state’s tax incentive limits and lack of necessary sound stages convinced him to shoot in Louisiana. Sev Ohanian, one of the film’s producers, hopes that the success of ‘Sinners’ will encourage change for Mississippi’s tax incentive program.

Clarksdale Culture 

For those unable to reach Clarksdale, the diversity of the Mississippi Delta that ‘Sinners’ highlights can now be experienced at home. The movie is available to buy or rent through several streaming platforms, allowing audiences to watch and rewatch one of the more alluring aspects of the film. 

One scene in particular from the horror film has fascinated audiences worldwide, including John Spann, who works with the Mississippi Humanities Council. He says when he initially saw the ‘Sinners,’  he was concerned the movie would be depicted in a stereotypical fashion: black and white, bleak, and cultureless. 

“When I saw the [Mississippi] Band of Choctaw Indians on the screen and they were in their traditional regalia, or the regalia that was true to that time that they were wearing with the sashes with the diamond beading, I knew right then,” he said. “I looked over to my wife and I said, oh my God, they got it right! They got it, right! And she looked at me like ‘huh?’ and I was like, no, those people are Choctaw people! I know from the language that they speak, how they speak it.”

The plot of ‘Sinners’ weaves fantasy horror from a range of different traditions, especially supernatural Blues legends, as the main character is a Black musician. But the film highlights other cultures that would have intersected the Black community in the Delta as well. 

Mark Patrick was one of the actors Spann saw on screen who is also a member of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians.

“My part in the movie was the Mississippi Choctaws horseback scout,” he said. “And I was responsible for watching the sunset and giving my guys the warning to leave before it got dark and get home.”

Patrick had one of the only Choctaw speaking parts in the film. Although the lines were not a part of the original script, he and other indigenous actors convinced the film’s director that it would add to the film’s authenticity of Choctaw culture.

Patrick's son, Marco, also plays a role in the film as a member of the Choctaw posse.

“Where I was, if you're watching the screen, the truck pulls up, and there's a horse on the left, there's a horse on right. I'm the one on the right, and I'm the one who dismounts when our leader exits the truck,” he said.

Another community playing a role in the movie is Chinese-Americans of the Mississippi Delta. 

Francis Wong is from Mandeville, Louisiana. He’s a background actor who plays an attendant in a Chinese-owned shop supplying a juke joint with groceries.  

“It was cool, very cool to represent the Mississippi Delta Chinese being a Southern Asian,” he said. “Because I've been background on a lot of movies playing other Asian roles. And I never talk about it, but this one I was very proud of and it was very cool.”

Wong says his own father immigrated from Hong Kong when he was young, and would drive to the Mississippi Delta from Louisiana to connect with other members of the Asian community.

“He talked about a dance hall that was here [Lucky Eleven] and they would have Chinese dances there,” he said. “My grandma had people from her village along the Delta.”

Wong says ‘Sinners’ gave him the chance to feel more at home in the region he’s from. 

“I’m a southern Asian,” he said. “I haven't been to Asia yet. But I've been othered in my town and all over, so it's cool to know I have some connections to the south here too.”

Marco, the Choctaw Sinners actor, hopes ‘Sinners’ will expand opportunities for Mississippi’s Choctaw community as well.

“The language, sadly, is dying out,” he said. “It's becoming extinct. We have several programs that are trying to help preserve it. But the old, I call it the old Choctaw dialect, where it's unbroken Choctaw, there's very few people who still talk that way. Now you have it where it is a mixture of Choctaw and English.”

Marco says he hopes the film will help his language, and culture, to have a resurgence. 

“This film having the Choctaw dialect in it, I think it'll really encourage people to say, you know what, if I continue learning my language, if I continue speaking it, it can help me have other opportunities,” he said.