Americana

From what I can gather, Americana is about a magic shirt. Not Harry Potter magic—more like “if your uncle’s old rodeo jacket had ghosts and bad intentions.” This so-called “ghost shirt” gets stolen, and suddenly a dusty small town is knee-deep in crime, blood, and country music dreams.

Sydney Sweeney plays Penny Jo, a waitress with a stutter and big aspirations. She’s apparently the emotional anchor of the whole thing, which is ironic because just a few months ago the internet was roasting her denim ad for looking like a campaign commercial filmed in a Bass Pro parking lot. Compared to that fiasco, Americana at least gives her something resembling dignity, even if she’s propping up a movie that critics say zigzags between Tarantino shootouts and Hallmark small-town drama.

The supporting cast looks like it was assembled from a very weird raffle: Paul Walter Hauser brooding, Simon Rex sleazing, Halsey wandering in because… sure, why not. Zahn McClarnon shows up and, as usual, everyone agrees he deserved more screen time than the script itself. And then there’s a kid convinced he’s Sitting Bull reincarnated, which sounds less like a plot device and more like something you’d overhear at a county fair.

Critics keep calling it “ambitious,” which is Hollywood code for “we’re still trying to figure out what the hell we just watched.” The San Francisco Chronicle said it’s like a toddler with a blender, which feels accurate. The box office didn’t love it, but hey, maybe it’ll find a second life on streaming, confusing people who thought they were clicking on Yellowstone.

Rating: Two haunted shirts out of five.