You can always rely on Jessica Chastain to play characters out of the ordinary: women unafraid to challenge the status quo, embrace a level of messiness society won’t always forgive, and march to the beat of their own drum. While her picks aren’t always slam-dunks, the consistency of her thematic interests across a diverse body of work is hard not to be in awe of. Those priorities are everywhere in Shana Feste’s serviceable (if not light on mystery) noir-thriller “Heartland,” an enjoyably pulpy, Nashville-set mystery with country music as the backdrop to a possible crime scene.
Chastain plays Misty Jones, an iconic and volatile country musician who’s fallen from grace a while ago for allegedly punching a fellow singer. Imagine her unapologetic portrayals of two go-getters: the sharp-tongued Miss Sloane and the no-nonsense Molly Bloom (with heels and jewelry traded in for a cowboy hat), and you’ll be in the ballpark of her hardboiled “Heartland” persona, slamming on piano keys when furious, gunning down a slimy dude’s windows out of (justifiable) rage, and snappily correcting those who dare to call her with the wrong nickname. “Queen of Mean?” Please. Try “C*nt of Country,” a label she wears like a badge of honor.
While “Heartland” can’t quite find its tonal rhythm amid its genre twists and touchingly feminine themes, Feste still gives us something breezy enough, elevated by zingers and Chastain’s committed performance as a once-worshipped artist investigating her niece’s disappearance. Said niece is the young Charlie Heart (country music star Carter Faith in her first acting role), a popular singer known for her frequent outbursts and disappearances, so much that the local police don’t take this last incident seriously.
So it falls to Misty to solve the puzzle amid an equally mystified and unhelpful maze of players, portrayed by the likes of John Hawkes, Ross Lynch, Jennifer Nettles, and more. The most prominent of them is a terrific Garrett Hedlund, in the role of Charlie’s concerned manager Roy Combs, a star-maker of sorts with a substantial reputation in Nashville.
Soon enough, not even the unsympathetic law enforcement can deny something fishy is going on when Misty discovers a pool of blood in Charlie’s home, along with the suspicious lyrics of a new song that she’s written and left behind. You’ll hear Chastain play and sing that song herself with Grade-A pipes—after all, she’s played the legendary country singer Tammy Wynette before in “George & Tammy”—along with several other catchy tunes like the eponymous “Heartland” and “Family Ties.”
Still, the most impressive part of the music isn’t how memorable it is, but how seamlessly the songs are woven into the narrative. Country music has always been about honest, even confessional lyrics carrying big, earnest emotions. You can internalize filmmaker Feste’s love and knowledge of this genre at every step, which feels like the main asset of a movie that uses the underbelly of the Nashville music scene as its noir-esque playground filled with predatory men.
Then again, if only the film could embrace the genre more stylishly on the page. As Misty goes after and antagonizes a series of suspicious players, everyone predictably gets flagged as a potential murderer. Is it the pompous ex? A jealous fellow singer? Her dad, or an unhinged fan? Or is the police covering up something several shades more sinister than meets the eye?
Many of these suspects lead to scenes that fizzle, and the reveal of the chief antagonist is one you can see coming from miles away. Elsewhere, while Misty’s own resolution feels honest in the very end, a scene where she makes good with a fellow country singer and redeems herself feels unearned, written more to make a point about female camaraderie than to enrich Misty’s storyline. It would have been preferable to see something left unredeemable about Misty—the same luxury often afforded to complex male protagonists we’re allowed to be in awe of, but not necessarily like.
Still, Feste and her cinematographer Khalid Mohtaseb are agile behind the camera, especially during a tense sequence involving an unhinged fan and his naïve grandma living in a dark, unkempt home that has seen better days. They also make sophisticated use of Nashville’s neon lights and sparkle in handsomely steered compositions, with Feste proving her genre chops as she did in the Sundance breakout horror “Run Sweetheart Run.” On that note, it’s a curious choice that “Heartland” is going straight to streaming instead of getting a theatrical run. Sometimes (say, on a random rainy Sunday), all you want is a fearless Jessica Chastain on a giant screen being an absolute baddie with a gun and a guitar.
