A small-town waitress, an unlucky-in-love suitor, a skeevy museum curator and assorted other creatures of the American west collide in "Americana," a hit-or-miss, lightly entertaining Tarantino riff with characters who are more memorable than the scenarios in which they are embroiled.

Sydney Sweeney is endearing as Penny Jo Poplin, a shy waitress in a diner who has big dreams of country music stardom, if only she can fight through the stammer that stunts her speech. She runs into Lefty Ledbetter (Paul Walter Hauser), a sweet-natured veteran of the Afghanistan War, who has a habit of proposing to women way too early in their relationship. He's asked for a hand in marriage and been rejected four times already in the course of a year.

Lefty — he's actually right-handed, which typifies write

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