Best Actor 2025: Michael B. Jordan in Sinners

Michael B. Jordan received his first Oscar nomination for portraying Elijah "Smoke" Moore and Elias "Stack" Moore in Sinners. 

Sinners follows a pair of twins in 1932 trying to setup a juke joint in the south which unfortunately the grand opening gets interrupted by vampires.

Michael B. Jordan takes on the fairly unique Oscar nominated role of playing two roles, where both roles are substantial parts within the film. Jordan’s performance is also unique because the effect of having him twice on screen is frequent within the film to the point you don’t really even think about Jordan playing both parts because the effect is seamless. The film though early on makes the clear distinction between the brothers as we first have the wide brimmed Stack with red highlights and the capped Smoke with blue highlights. This distinction is emphasized all the more by the first scene where the two go about buying what they think is a local sawmill from a white landowner. The first question being if they’re twins, to which Jordan as Smoke stays silent, while Stack smiles and says “Nah we cousins” with a slightly more pronounced southern accent that feels wholly natural, which pretty much tells you so much about both men in this quick action. Essentially Jordan is tasked with two distinct types of performances to lead the film, with Stack he’s basically asked to pull out all of his charisma into the role, meanwhile as Smoke he’s asked to be the stoic somewhat cold protagonist. Two separate challenges that often intertwine with each other as contrast. 

As Stack Jordan very much runs away with the role and that is all there is to it. There’s so much energy he brings that also feels so easy from him in creating the state of the expression of the guy who seems to want to accentuate the fun to be had in life as the starting point. Jordan commonly fits just this sly smile and just eagerness to roll with everything. Jordan delivers on such overwhelming charisma for the role where he is just shining in every scene he’s in until the switch of his character occurs. Where we see the spark in his eyes as most eager to start the juke joint as the most pleasurable of endeavors to him. Establishing a strong sense of his style and relationship as we see with their young cousin Sammie (Miles Caton), where Jordan brings such a strong sense of older brotherly warmth towards the younger Sammie and you can wholly sense how he just wants the best of him. Even his “well get him back in one piece” to Sammie’s strict religious father is with an earnest protective quality for him. Contrasting that strictly his Jordan’s more subdued work as Smoke where he keeps an often sullen expression and limited words to begin with but the deliveries he does have are sharp and direct. Where with Stack we saw the love, Jordan conveys a cold protection with harsh overtones of tough love. Such as when Sammie finds a snake in their hidden truck and Jordan makes his delivery of telling Sammie to step aside in frankly a dismissive way which effectively illustrates Smoke contrasting approach. 

Within the setup of the film with both men moving to run errands to set-up their grand opening we get the disparate approaches to wrangling what they need. With Stack we get a bit more charm with the casual ease in which he broaches musician Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo) to perform for the night, just through a slight smile and the enticing promise of beer with a bit of wink. We see him recruit a bouncer in Cornbread, where Jordan with a knowing smile both makes fun of Cornbread while also promising the strongest of sexual favors from his wife. Both deliveries Jordan realizes with the same charismatic ease of someone who knows how to pester then pester right to charm with that distinct sense of joy in each moment. Contrasting Stack’s easygoing manner we have Smoke go into town to buy supplies and set up a few things with the local shopkeep. Jordan’s performance in these moments I do think is less interesting than his work as Stack, and yes Stack is the showier role, however there is a way to be great when stoic, and I don’t think Jordan quite gets there. Rather he’s wholly fine in just projecting that direct coldness, that goes so far as to kneecap a local who tries to steal from his truck. Jordan emphasizes very much just the severe directness of Smoke as a man with a purpose, which while not but the stoicism didn’t quite sing for me in the same way he does with his charisma as Stack. One reason for the separation being that Smoke killed their father when he beating Stack. Which is a great scene for Jordan as Stack managing to start with the typical joking way before naturally segueing to a bit more somberness where we sense his respect for his brother and also his own hardship even if he's not anchored by it in the same way as Smoke. 

Throughout this sequence we also are introduced to the two disparate love interests of the twins, for Stack we have Mary (Hailee Steinfeld) and for Smoke we have his estranged wife Annie (Wunmi Mosaku). With Stack, Jordan and Steinfeld’s chemistry is one of the extremely sexually charged where both are constantly doing with each other’s eyes what Bob Ferguson was going to do with Willa’s friend in One Battle After Another. Capturing just really their intense attraction, complicated by Mary's mixed but mostly white ancestry, where even that Jordan plays the notion of just wanting to give her up for her sake with an atypical but convincing moment of a bit of meekness from Stack. Rectified as we see convincingly just from that attraction which Jordan and Steinfeld realize with considerable ease. Contrasting that is the relationship between Annie and Smoke which is strained by the death of their child. Something that might speak to Smoke coldness in general however again I will say the actual scene between Mosaku and Jordan isn’t one of my favorites for the latter. Jordan brings a sullen face, but I feel he doesn’t quite find enough of expressing the internalization of his deep pain. Particularly the moment where he explains his struggle to come back to where there’s all that pain, a moment that I do feel from Mosaku’s performance but Jordan’s performance left me wanting more. It feels the moment to most crack open the stoic a bit, or show it truly festering underneath within the moment and I just don’t fully see either. And again I don’t think he’s bad, but it feels like a moment for something truly profound that I don’t think his performance entirely delivers on. It might stand out more to me because I think there's moments from Creed where Jordan is able to play this type of note far more successfully than he does here. 

Throughout the opening night then we get the continuation of Jordan bringing such energy and fun with Stack, including a bit of extra empathy towards unpaying customers that Jordan all brings so naturally, and then we have that consistent sullen intensity of Smoke making the hardest rules and choices throughout the night. Unfortunately the night brings more than a lack of profits, we also get the entrance of vampires led by Remmick (Jack O’Connell). Where sadly they turn both Mary and Stack. Saddest of all because I’ll admit I kind of think this makes Stack suddenly the less interesting character as the puppet of Remmick, though Jordan does make the most of his dancing at Remmick's behest scene where he’s having the time of his life and that’s pretty great. But beyond that we just basically get evil Stack where Jordan delivers enough at being slightly maniacal as Remmick’s puppet but not as interesting as what came before. Conversely however I find that his performance as Smoke takes hold a bit more in bringing the commanding presence as his calm leads the other humans in dealing with their supernatural threat. With some striking moments of basically now revealing the emotion a bit more clearly in directly playing the grief of seeing his family and friends die, particularly in his moving reaction to having to kill Annie, though I’ll admit I’m a little taken out of the scene just because it seems like all the vampires decide to just let them have their emotional moment for reasons unknown, and also greater expression of real concern for Sammie throughout. Jordan holds together as the heroic lead in this section effectively, where the intensity does come to life more and we see the emotion fueling that intensity right till the end. 

Where Jordan has an especially striking moment of protecting Sammie at the end, where he conveys quickly in his eyes the sense of relief in finding no bites on Sammie and also watching in horror as the vampires all burn alive. Followed by the climax after the climax where Stack battles the Ku Klux Klan that had been sent to kill the twins. Jordan’s compelling in again bringing emotion within the action scene and finds more emotion in his final moments after Smoke is fatally wounded in the battle and sees a vision of Annie and their child. Jordan’s depiction of his relief and acceptance is good, even if maybe not quite as powerful as the film intends. As much as I wasn’t wowed by much of Jordan as Stack as a vampire, I will say thankfully he does have a great scene in the film’s epilogue, where the surviving vampires of Mary and Stack visit an aged Sammie (Buddy Guy). Although not fully explained by the film one can assume that Stack is released from the vampire hive mind as Jordan plays the scene much more like Stack was in the early scenes of the film, with the caveat of a bit of sorrow of the immortal having lived decades as a vampire. Jordan delivers a wonderful sense of nostalgia towards Sammie’s music and even that warmth again towards his now older appearing cousin, and the simple appreciation of the man’s music once again. Followed by maybe Jordan’s single best moment which is his wistful agreement with Sammie over how happy the vampire day was before the vampires showed up. Jordan’s moment brings so much heart, so much regret, so much pain, but also a sense of love as he recounts it being the only day he felt truly free. It’s an outstanding final moment, in a very good set of performances. And I do hate how it feels like a damning his performance by merely thinking it is very good, given I don’t think Jordan is ever bad here, he goes from fine to great, and in a way the “fine’ moments stand out because he’s also great.