20 Recent Horror Movies WAY Better Than Expected
7. Sinners
Now to be clear, nobody was expecting Ryan Coogler's Sinners to be anything less than good, given the Creed and Black Panther filmmaker's absolutely rock solid track record.
But "solid" is very much the word here - it seemed likely that Coogler would deliver a well made, compellingly acted vampire film that did OK at the box office and was largely ignored by the Academy.
Yet Sinners turned out to be one of 2025's big surprises - a hefty, ambitious meal of a vampire film which keenly subverted expectations of the subgenre and took some massive risks while being technically jaw-dropping and brilliantly acted to boot.
Sinner wasn't just "great for a vampire film" - it's Coogler's magnum opus to date, and one so confidently crafted and compelling to behold that even the famously horror-averse Academy couldn't ignore it.
In the end Sinners racked up an astonishing, record-breaking 16 Oscar nominations, and the odds are looking good that it takes at least a few of them home.