Movie Review: Hearts Beat Loud

Hearts Beat Loud *** ½ / *****

Directed by: Brett Haley.

Written by: Brett Haley & Marc Basch.

Starring: Nick Offerman (Frank Fisher), Kiersey Clemons (Sam Fisher), Ted Danson (Dave), Toni Collette (Leslie), Sasha Lane (Rose), Blythe Danner (Marianne Fisher).

 

It would take a harder, more cynical person than I am to resist Hearts Beat Loud – a sweet film about a father/daughter combo who decide (he more than she) to start in a band together in the final summer before she goes off to college. It’s a time where everything is changing for both of them – they both know it will never be the same again, and so they hold on, just a little bit longer, before everything has to change. This isn’t really a film with a lot of high drama, or even a lot at stake. It’s a mostly quiet, sweet film that unless you’re a hard hearted cynic, will sweep you along in its pleasant vibe.

 

Frank (Nick Offerman) is a widower who has run Red Hook Records, a vinyl store, in Red Hook Brooklyn for 17 years, but now it’s time to close it down. His landlord, Leslie (Toni Collette) is nice, and held off raising the rent on him for years, because now she has to – although the word gentrification isn’t uttered in the film, it’s the reason why this once industrial neighborhood has become a hot spot. Frank still mourns for his late wife – he hasn’t moved on – and now with his store closing, he doesn’t have much left. What he does have is his daughter, Sam (Kiersey Clemons), a smart, responsible teenager, about to go to UCLA for pre-med in the fall. She has her life planned out.

 

The relationship between father-daughter is the heart of the film here – Sam is more mature and realistic about her future than Frank is about his – he still acts like a big kid. Which is how they start recording some songs together than summer – she has written the lyrics, together they do the music, and the songs are catchy and sweet. He uploads one to Spotify, and is surprised when he hears it in a local coffee shop. It’s made a Playlist – which to him is a sign of big things to come, for her not so much. While they record a few more songs, she knows this isn’t going to last forever – even if he’s fooling himself into thinking there is a future here.

 

There are other plot strains in the film – Sam’s tentative, sweet blossoming romance with Rose (Sasha Lane) – which the movie treats, refreshingly, as no big deal (for a while, you wonder if there’s going to be a big “coming out” scene, until it becomes clear Frank already knows, and doesn’t care) which is a nice relationship, but tinged with sadness as they both know Sam is leaving. There is the friendship between Frank and Leslie – which hints at being something more, but perhaps isn’t. Or Frank’s friendship with Dave (Ted Danson), a stoner who owns an “authentic” Red Hook dive bar. Oh, and Frank’s mother (Blythe Danner), who is caught shoplifting more than once. All of these relationships are low-key, low stakes, and down to earth.

 

The film was directed by Brett Haley, who seems to be specializing in these kind of low-key indies – having recently made I’ll See You in My Dreams, with Danner as a widow who finds, and loses, love again and The Hero, with Sam Elliot, as a former movie star, who finds out he’s dying. Both of those films were fine, if more than a little forgettable, but did give good, veteran actors good lead roles to play. Here, it’s somewhat similar – giving Offerman the type of role I haven’t seen him in before (not even in The Hero, where he was the stoner friend – perhaps that means we can expect to see a similar film with Ted Danson next year from Haley). It’s a sweet, subtle and sad performance – and he never oversells it. Clemons is just as good as Sam – she has a great voice, and is a fine performer, and is good at the scenes with Frank, where she has to be the grown up, and with Rose, where he is the sweet kid in love. I loved Clemons in Dope a few years ago, and love her again here.

 

If there is a problem with Hearts Beat Loud, it’s probably that the stakes are just too low. Haley clearly doesn’t like to force his characters into phony dramatic situations – and you can see all the ways he could have done that here. By choosing none of them, he is making a statement in his way, but it makes for a film perhaps could have a use a little more momentum. Still, when the finale comes – and we hear those songs, it’s hard to complain.