Ryan Coogler is one of the best filmmakers working in Hollywood. The guy knows how to tackle big IPs, and his direction and storytelling within them are personal and fearless.
Still, when I see his name behind Creed and Black Panther, while I am excited, I’ve always been more stoked about when he would make the leap to an original. He has such a fun voice and such a rich perspective, I really wanted to know how hard he would hit with the gloves off.
Well, my excitement bubbled over when Sinners was announced, a vampire and gangster movie set in the South.
Coogler recently sat down with Mike Fleming at Deadline, and talked about how excited he was to finally show his unfiltered voice on screen.
Let’s take a look at a quote that made me so happy to read.
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As I said up top, Coogler has mostly worked in IP in Hollywood. Even his first film, Fruitvale Station was adapted from a real-life story.
Still, Coogler has always found a way to share a little of his soul with us in each and every one of them.
He said, “I found a way into all of them, but Fruitvale Station was a real story that happened. Creed, that I was making for my dad, that was my way in, but that was Sly Stallone’s, and Irwin Winkler and Bob Chartoff, their thing. I reframed it and made it personal, but that was still their thing. Black Panther, that was an open directing assignment, a job I was hired for. Thankfully the studio was interested in my perspective, in my reframing, and it was four years into that fabric, bro, because of the tragedy we all endured. But I looked up, and I got two kids now, one was born in Georgia while I was there making a movie. And I said, bro, I’m almost 40. I got this company that can make things. I’ve engaged with audiences all over the planet, man. Who can say, at my age, that they’ve had four movies released theatrically? And yet I still haven’t really opened myself up to the audience.”
This idea of not yet telling the audience who he is and what he thinks and feels is such a true feeling for all artists, and one I am so happy he’s privileged enough to see and to be able to share with us.
Sinners is his first big original idea on the screen, and one he felt okay putting off Black Panther 3 in order to tell.
Coogler went on to elaborate on this quote. When asked about how he puts other pieces of himself into these movies, he came back with, “But I still haven’t brought something that was just me. And how funny is it that when I say, ‘Hey, I’m making a horror movie,’ and people are surprised. But if you know me, I love those movies. If I had to reckon with the fact that the audience doesn’t truly know me. And I got scared that I would look up and be 50 and would still be in that situation. And by then, I might not have anything to say. So the movie was made because I had to make it right now. And with the people that I wanted to make it with, it had to happen now. Or if not, it wouldn’t. I feared that. And that was why now.”
I love how he sees the opportunity to commune with the audience, and how much he knows it may not be around forever. Hollywood is so fickle and so fleeting, watching him take the opportunity to shine and to believe in the talent that brought him here is really fulfilling, and it should inspire everyone who reads it to seek those opportunities out.
And to share part of themselves with every piece of work.
Let me know what you think in the comments.
Author: Jason Hellerman
This article comes from No Film School and can be read on the original site.
