Chicago-based writer and director Blake Martin is set to release Sin and Bones, a romantic drama starring DeVon Lamont Thomas and Nolita Pore, on November 15 via TheBlkScript. The film marks the fourth and final installment in an ambitious self-imposed experiment: writing, directing, and releasing four original short films in four consecutive months.
The project began after Martin was hired to direct a major film production, only to be dismissed on his first day after being told he was too inexperienced for the role. Rather than wait for another opportunity, he built his own, releasing On Hold in August, M.A.I.D. in September, and Alone, Now in October, before closing out the run with Sin and Bones. Collectively, the films have drawn hundreds of thousands of views, picked up festival recognition, and caught the attention of entertainment industry executives, momentum that’s since led to a Warner Bros. creative film grant for summer 2027.
Sin and Bones follows Saint Washington, played by Thomas, a 28-year-old Chicago mechanic with a love for jazz and bigger dreams than his circumstances currently allow, and Brooke Monroe, played by Pore, a Yale-educated, 40-year-old music executive serving as President of A&R at Columbia Records. When their worlds collide, the attraction is immediate, but as the relationship develops, the two discover they want fundamentally different things from each other, Brooke an escape from the pressures of her professional life, Saint the possibility of finally being chosen rather than simply wanted.
Martin drew direct inspiration from two defining figures in Black cinema: Jacqueline Broyer from Boomerang, played by Robin Givens, and Darius Lovehall from Love Jones, played by Larenz Tate. “I’ve always been fascinated by those characters because they were allowed to be complicated,” Martin said, describing his goal of bringing that same complexity, flawed, ambitious, emotionally messy, into his own characters. He described the film’s core tension directly: “We tend to assume that if two people are intimate enough, something deeper must exist. But sometimes one person is experiencing a relationship while the other is simply enjoying an arrangement.”
Filmed entirely in Chicago, the film also stars Ron Russell and Matthew Phipps, and was produced by Amanda Ballard, with Martin, Travis Starks, Ashford, and Ballard serving as executive producers. LaTaryion “LT” Perry served as associate producer and first AD.
Martin brings more than 25 years of experience in fashion, photography, and creative direction to his filmmaking work, including two Vogue covers and more than 300 fashion shows, alongside prior directing credits on the series Sunday Evenings and Messy Lola, starring Cynthia Kaye McWilliams. He’s now developing his feature film debut, Altars, a psychological thriller centered on identity, trauma, and Black men’s mental health.
With a Warner Bros. grant already secured and a feature now in development, Martin’s four-film sprint looks less like a one-off experiment and more like the foundation he built specifically to get there.