A moody portrait of early-twentysomething ambivalence, and navigating the free-floating jealousies and interpersonal uncertainties that frequently attach themselves to young adulthood, Chestnut serves as the latest crossover effort at carrying a movie by a young cast member of the zeitgeist-capturing Netflix sensation Stranger Things — in this case, Natalia Dyer.

Earnest but unremarkable, the movie fails to connect in large measure because of its lethargic plotting. But plenty of coming-of-age tales indulge in atmosphere and a sharply defined sense of place rather than huge narrative twists and turns, and therefore work just fine as character studies. The bigger problem with Chestnut is that it feels so lacking in distinct personality and details as to come across as bland and generic — the flavorless discount store brand of a fizzy, popular item.
Annie James (Dyer) is a recent college graduate living somewhere around Philadelphia. Before heading west in the fall to start a fancy new job in Los Angeles, she connects one night in a local dive bar with the somewhat inscrutable Tyler (Rachel Keller) and Danny (Danny Ramirez). Friends and maybe more, the pair work part-time as caterers, but mainly seem to exist as a young, slacker, cosplay embodiment of the “We Saw You From Across the Bar and Really Dig Your Vibe” meme.
The only rub is that Annie can’t quite determine the nature of their relationship, and therefore her own blossoming connections to each party, respectively. Is Tyler gay or bisexual, and interested in Annie? Is Danny? Is Tyler being somewhat flirtatious to leverage Annie’s attention, and make Danny envious? All of the above, or none? Annie tumbles into an emotionally adrift summer, occasionally consulting with her friend Jason (Chella Man), who also finds himself at a post-graduation crossroads.
Dyer’s diminutive physical stature and youthful look (now 29, she would have been around 26 when shooting this movie) make her an easy and believable enough match for Annie’s age. But her awkwardness playing drunk and various other moments belie this additional life experience. In most ways, her performance feels like a surface-level thing, marked by play-acted and sign-posted emotions rather than flowing compellingly from the inside out.

Keller (Tokyo Vice) and Ramirez (Top Gun: Maverick) have more success, and it actually helps that their characters are written as both ciphers and somewhat functional, serving the main story of Annie’s journey. Keller in particular reads as a bit mysterious; even when Tyler lets a supposed “truth” slip out, one wonders if she’s trading in layered deceit, the product of an instinctive need to protect herself from (further?) trauma.
The feature debut of writer-director Jac Cron, Chestnut made its premiere last year at the Frameline Film Festival, and will, one supposes, find some level of embrace amongst arthouse viewers who hand out extra credit for the depiction of social progressivism within a movie. Sexuality is depicted here matter-of-factly as part of a sliding-scale spectrum, and there are no characters who react with shock about this or that hook-up.
Neither is Chestnut a movie about late-onset personal awakening (that is to say, a straight-presenting character grappling with sudden attraction to a same-sex person), a topic or narrative framing that, for whatever reason, seems to have been met with increasing amounts of derision by a slice of younger audiences. While her preference and past sexual history isn’t front and center for much of the movie, Annie is presented as bisexual at the very least.

For all its back-foot plotting, though, Cron’s script fails to come up with interesting points of illumination that might still work as part of a piece of cinematic portraiture. She has characters say “Important Things” before we at all know them (“Sometimes I feel like this is the only place that has ever felt like home for me,” intones one supporting character, mere moments into the scene introducing them), as if this is some crafty shortcut to insight and significance.
Additionally, multiple phone calls and voice messages between Annie and her dad don’t really connect, instead coming across as a cheap, writerly gambit — a stab at generating emotion without spending on shooting a more complex set-up or location. Viewers never meet Annie’s father, and the description of both the character and her relationship with him is entirely one-sided, rendering these sequences largely pointless. All they do is pad the running time, and serve as a goosing reminder of the “ticking clock” of summertime’s countdown.
Chiefly through the savvy use of some twilight interstitials by cinematographer Matt Cleg, there’s a hazy, magic-hour sensibility to a couple bits of the movie’s visual construction that matches its thematic ambiguity. A good number of other sequences, though, feel cramped and dark, as Cron and Cleg struggle to find adequate differentiation between the under-populated bars and sparsely decorated apartment rooms that serve as the film’s primary locations.
Chestnut is a well-meaning and sincere attempt at capturing some of the swirling confusion that rushes in during that intermediate stage between school (whether high school or university) and real, honest-to-goodness adult life. Unfortunately, most of it doesn’t work. 

Our Rating

Summary
Landing on digital platforms after its theatrical engagements, the movie may find warmer reception among Dyer’s Stranger Things fans. Most moviegoers, however, will be left a bit cold and bored.