Just last week, Ryan Coogler’s Sinners became not only the most decorated movie among 2026 Oscar nominees, but the most nominated movie of all time. It sweetens a landmark deal that the writer/director made prior to filming the vampire flick, which gives him complete ownership of Sinners in 25 years. A lot of Hollywood has been talking about Coogler’s deal lately, including Ben Affleck, who got honest about his thoughts on the move.
Along with being a big star in Hollywood, Ben Affleck is an accomplished writer, director and producer too, having been behind the scenes on movies like Good Will Hunting, The Town, Argo and more. Here’s what he had to say about Coogler’s Sinners deal:
Ryan’s a really — seems like a very, very smart guy, and he did a really smart thing with that deal, which is that he – kind of related to this idea of ownership, like talking about Air and the Jordan deal earlier. You’re going to get the movie, and you’re going to get to release the movie. But like, they’re going to be participants in it, and they got what’s called a reversion so that Ryan and I assume other principal creators, the movie reverts back to his ownership.
Affleck definitely isn’t the first big name to applaud Coogler for his deal with Warner Bros, which was made in 2024, prior to the movie starting production. Spike Lee also called it a “smart move,” citing that the only movie he owns from his filmography is She’s Gotta Have It.
Tyler Perry has also said that he actually called Coogler following Black Panther and walked him through how to make the kind of deal he eventually made with Sinners.
Speaking a bit more about this deal, Affleck continued:
Because there’s a lot of value in a movie — the movies that are really successful. They have a lot of value, it’s called like the tails. People, they’ll still license a movie for $10 [to] $20 million to Netflix or Prime or Max, that’s been out a long time, because people will still watch it because it’s like a big, big hit. So, now, Ryan will be able to, not just be able to get a piece of it now but, when they’re going to license Sinners again, that’s all going back to him. And he bet on himself, right? And it really now accrues the value of that.
Coogler will be in his sixties once Sinners gets handed over to him, which could make for a nice retirement for the visionary filmmaker, depending on the value of the movie by that time. Affleck, who has been in the movie business for 45 years, certainly thinks he made a solid deal that could make him quite a bit of money down the line while on the All The Smoke podcast. He also said this:
Yeah, [it’s] very, very sharp, very innovative. It was very controversial. A lot of people on the studio side were mad at Warner Brothers. Because it was like, you’re giving away this value, but that’s an example of using that leverage. It’s like, ‘Okay, you figure this guy’s so good, and he’s got this cast, and this script’s so good. This is what I want.’ It changed the business essentially.
Time will certainly tell, but as one veteran entertainment and technology attorney, Jonathan Handel, commented before on the deal, Coogler is “rolling the dice” regarding the deal. As far as things have gone so far between its commercial appeal and critical praise, the filmmaker's bet on himself certainly seems like it will be worthwhile.
Perhaps the next question regarding this conversation is whether more big filmmakers with original ideas will try to walk in his footsteps and succeed, or not. Currently, Coogler’s deal is a rather rare one in Hollywood, but it could really shake the industry up.
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