Gold Hearts of Hot Rod County: Coming of Age in Souped Up Cars

David Kobzantsev’s Gold Hearts of Hot Rod County is a drama whose romance can speak itself only in the language of roaring engines and storms of dust. Running to twenty minutes, the film revolves around the push and pull bond between Zack and Callie, teenage spirit burning hot across acres and acres of farmland. 

With his Clint Eastwood face and James Dean air, Zack (Noah Fearnley) thinks he’s hot shit. Callie (Shayla Stensby) might agree, but she keeps herself too busy with her father’s tractor to let herself say it. Said father (Travis Joe Dixon), to no one’s surprise, does not like the cocky, reckless bad boy who wants to win a car race against him. Of course, what he really wants is to show off to Callie, but he will not say it—her dad is not listening anyway. 

The film divides its time between the two protagonists, showing glimpses of each that the other would not have seen, including a crack in the boy’s facade when his wait for something (or someone) ends in disappointment. Like the classic romances, the two narrative threads illustrate on the one hand the beginning of Callie’s coming of age into strength, and on the other, Zack’s mellowing, until the two can meet on the same plane.

The film uses sweeping shots of the landscape, as ostensibly limitless as the horizons its protagonists see for themselves. Cars fly, the music flows, and competitiveness blazes to mask the fragile rays of hope. When things dare show themselves plainly, as with a 80s influenced dance sequence halfway into the film, they also leave that hope vulnerable to cruelty of the same intensity as love. There is something very Riverdale-esque about it. 

The climax features the inevitable race, cut such that it distinguishes Callie from Zack, the two rarely in the same frame. For one, it is a moment of glory. For the other, open-mouthed awe. And though only one can win, the triumph belongs to both. This is, after all, a love story.