Music and film have always had a tender chemistry, and independent cinema has-as of the last decade at least-also had a strong interest in examining relationships through music (think "Once" and some of the films it inspired). In "Hearts Beat Loud," filmmaker Brett Haley widens that focus from romantic relationships to interfamily ones, in this case between a father and daughter.
The film's greatest strength is its depiction of the song creation process. Not the nuts and bolts, but the vulnerability of creation and sharing, and its precisely that act of emotional exposure that allows Frank (Nick Offerman) and Sam (Kiersey Clemons) to connect despite their inability to speak their emotions directly. The film feels most alive in its musical moments thanks to strong editing, and Haley and his co-writer Marc Basch succeed most at showing how music creation provides them each their own needed release as well as a shared catharsis.
Story-wise, Haley and Basch keep it simple. Sam is a majorly smart kid taking pre-med classes her summer before attending Stanford. Paying her tuition is a big piece of why single dad Frank is going to close his Red Hook-based record store. After Frank nudges her to jam with him, he posts their track to Spotify and it gets attention-much to Frank's delight and Sam's chagrin. Meanwhile, Sam's found her first love (Sasha Lane) and Frank is trying to figure out what's next, with some nudging from his landlady (Toni Collette).
All this to say, the conflict in the movie is mostly interpersonal. It's a lot of moments of connection and discovery (mostly through music). Not much happens in the way of surprises. Instead, Haley steers well wide of melodrama, creating a low-key, contemplative vibe. Consequently, the music scenes, featuring interesting, layered alternative pop music by Keegan DeWitt, feel like the movie's action sequences. All the music is also performed on set, and that kind of authenticity proves critical in a film this intimate.
Whether it's Offerman preforming a song that's not as musically tight or the authentic breaks in Clemons' voice in which you can tell she's belting out the words as best she can, most films don't expose themselves or their performers musically in this way, but there aren't the same expectations of performance that you have with a movie-musical. We also get sequences that play like music videos, such as when Frank picks up the guitar out of pure need to make music, which is cut with Sam taking a big risk for the first time. It's a beautiful weaving together of two different responses to the same emotional stimulus, reminding us that music is about something deeper.
"Hearts Beat Loud" will give viewers more of a mellow musical buzz than a rush of music-driven emotion, but in the movie musical's typical tightrope walk between authenticity and clichéd whimsy, so often filmmakers fall to the larger-than-life side, and "Hearts Beat Loud" is a nice counterbalance.
~Steven C
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