Metacritic reviews

It gets away with missteps because of how consistently heartwarming and affable the people on screen are. Clemons and Offerman are especially effective, with Frank’s earnestness comically shot down by Clemons’ quick-witted preciousness.

Heartfelt and unassuming but likely to prompt a few complaints that it doesn't ring true.

Clemons has been a luminous presence who could bloom into a great grown-up actress. Hearts Beat Loud proves she’s the real deal. As for the film around her, Haley’s 21-drum solo salute to the passage of time is, like Frank, merely fine. But he admirably keeps his characters’ victories small and their losses familiar, making his movie a ballad everyone can hum to.

Energized by Offerman and Clemons, the effectiveness of the music and the emotional freshness of "Hearts Beat Loud" are finally triumphant. Sometimes wearing your heart on your sleeve is the only way to go.

This film is often slight but always welcoming. The two leads have a pleasant chemistry that elevates each exchange and build out a meaningful–and meaningfully deep–relationship that’s easy to engage with and root fo

Hearts Beat Loud is smart, sincere, expertly performed (though Ted Danson, in a small role as Frank’s favorite bartender, gets little to do apart from echo Sam Malone), quietly progressive (Sam’s ethnicity and sexuality elicit no onscreen comment whatsoever), and just thoroughly… nice.

The real reason to see this film is Kiersey Clemons’s Sam and her romance with aspiring artist Rose (Sasha Lane).

With its oversimplified emotions and dumbed-down depiction of the creative process, this inoffensive time-filler dissolves in the mouth like vanilla pudding.

By all rights, it should be a heartwarming comedy with a few more tender moments. Instead, Hearts Beat Loud operates like a sad drama with a few moments that might make you smile. We knew punk was dead, but the comedy doesn’t have to be.

The steadiness with which Haley's film progresses through its dramatic beats is rather like its familiar-sounding indie pop, moving rhythmically toward a predictable climax whose emotional intensity feels unearned.