Aylmer to Zazzoo and Beyond: April 2013

MUD
(2013 - April 26)
Drama
2 hr. 10 min.

Rated: PG-13 Language, violence and some sexual references
Grade: B

Director: Jeff Nichols
Writer: Jeff Nichols
Stars: Matthew McConaughey, Tye Sheridan, Jacob Lofland | See full cast and crew

Mud is an adventure about two boys, Ellis and his friend Neckbone, who find a man named Mud hiding out on an island in the Mississippi. Mud describes fantastic scenarios-he killed a man in Texas and vengeful bounty hunters are coming to get him. He says he is planning to meet and escape with the love of his life, Juniper, who is waiting for him in town. Skeptical but intrigued, Ellis and Neckbone agree to help him. It isn't long until Mud's visions come true and their small town is besieged by a beautiful girl with a line of bounty hunters in tow. (c) Roadside Attractions

Mud is actually one of those films that after watching the trailer I wasn't very interested in seeing. I am not a big Matthew McConaughey fan. On an opening weekend of nothing but R rated movies except for Mud, I decided on Mud.

Mathew McConaughey in the title role of Mud actually surprised me, he wasn't half bad, but for me the real stars and the true strength of this movie are the two teenage boys, Tye Sheridan and Jacob Lofland. These two boys have terrific chemistry with each other and with Mr. McConaughey.

Mud is a little bit Huckleberry Finn and a little bit Stand By Me. It plays like a novel brought to the silver screen but it is, in fact, an original screenplay. I enjoyed the detail and attention spent on the settings, not only the sets but also the atmosphere of the town, the riverboat homes the river and swamps. Writer/director Jeff Nichols (Take Shelter), has in Mud laid out a tale of love and change, set in a unique backwater Arkansas backdrop, populated with a host of well-drawn characters. At the same time the film's story, sadly, is also a bit scatter shot and bloated as it unfolds. Some of the story’s thematic and narrative potency gets a bit muddled and is sacrificed by the process by the film's end.

The film has too many characters. Nichols has a gift for writing three-dimensional, non-stereotypical characters that run the gamete on the scale of good and bad people, but Mud drifts off course where it doesn’t need to, into fruitless diversions.

Mud is 2 hours and 10 minutes and is about 30 minutes too long because of these meanderings, they put a drag on what is otherwise a rich and compelling narrative. For example, there are characters like Neckbone’s uncle/guardian Galen (Michael Shannon) and Mud’s neighbor, Tom (Sam Shepard), or May Pearl (Bonnie Sturdivant) Ellis' coming of age love interest, that are given considerable screen time but their importance as characters are, to be generous, periphery at best.

However, secondary characters like Ellis’ parents (Ray McKinnon and Sarah Paulson) which are in fact relevant, but they feel a little extraneous to the main narrative. Then there are character like King (Joe Don Baker - Goldeneye) and Carver (Paul Sparks - Boardwalk Empire) that actually appear for only one or two moments of any significance but they are the main threat driving the central plot. Even Juniper (Reese Witherspoon) seems little more than a plot device. Witherspoon delivers a solid performance contrary to her usual cute bubbly characters, but eve she is just another element, a critical element, that the story never really gets into.

This is also true of the character Mud, he is so ethereal and mysterious that he hardly seems real at times, especially in the beginning but McConaughey delivers a great performance, he has Mud constantly teetering between likable and menacing but even in Mud, there is more implied about his character than the film ever Now about the two young boys that truly hold Mud together, the pivotal performances of Tye Sheridan and Jacob Lofland, making his film debut, are extraordinary. Right from the start, we know that these two boys are not your stereotypical, backwater hicks. Nichols' script and directing delves in depth into complexity of these two young men (primary Ellis) as they are coming of age in a highly untypical manner.

Tye Sheridan is very impressive, his face, his sharp eyes exhibit an acute self-awareness when he plays his scenes. Lofland has a very different attitude, with razor sharp timing. He has an odd type of charisma making him a joy to watch, and together, the pair have chemistry that make them a formidable protagonist team. A lot of their scenes where they interact with McConaughey are positively brilliant. This film isn’t simply about these two boys, even though it is clearly Ellis’ story, but there is too much that is superficial inserted that tends to make the film drag a bit at times, there are subplots like Ellis’ girlfriend problems that although they may be poingant and charming do nothing to further the plot.

Nichols, in his director's hat, is incredible while creating film's unique little world. He has ingeniously brought to life, on screen, the dying world of 'backwater river folk'. It is so visually captivating and so fully fleshed in this film, in a way that is rarely seen in main stream cinema. In the opening scenes and continuing on through the first half of the film, the narrative that chronicles Ellis and Neckbone’s meeting and bonding with Mud, is in fact, almost dreamlike in its nature. It is absolutely beautiful iconagraphy and what critics term mise-en-scène composition. (Mise-en-scène is a French expression used to describe the design aspects of a theater or film production, which essentially means "visual theme" or "telling a story", a term referring to the sum total of what appears before the camera, what the viewer sees, its arrangement—the composition, the sets, the props, the actors, the costumes, the lighting—everything, the whole). Nichols' genius shines here in Mud.

Mud's story centers on an Arkansas river-rat, a teenage boy named Ellis (Tye Sheridan), and his river-rat friend, “Neckbone” (Jacob Lofland), who spends their days exploring the local rivers, eddies and islands. On one of these expeditions the boys discover a boat on an island that a recent flood had washed up into a tree which they quickly claim as their own. One small problem though, they find someone is already living in the boat, a mysterious drifter named Mud. The boys encounter him when they return to their outboard that brought them to the island. To the boys he is threatening yet intriguing and when he ask them to help him, the boys are suspicious but cautiously agree. It doesn't take long for Ellis and Neckbone to learn that Mud is entangled in a dangerous web involving his beautiful lifelong love, Juniper (Reese Witherspoon), the law, and a posse of Texas bounty hunters, led by King (Joe Don Baker), looking for some payback. Even though Ellis is going through some serious life challenges of his own at the moment he is fascinated by Mud and Juniper’s star-crossed love story. That fascination will put him, and everyone around him, in great danger as he is dragged into Mud's perilous web of lies and deceit.

In the second half of the film the tone changes from dreamy ideals to stark realities although it still carries that slightly surreal aesthetic through many shots and sequences that heightens the intrigue and beauty of this depressing working-class dead end world. Mud employs a captivating subtext of dread that runs throughout the film. Ellis lives in a world that at no time feels safe or secure.

Ultimately, Mud walks a fine line between childhood and adulthood in a manner reminiscent, as I said earlier of Huckelberry Finn and Stand By Me. Mud is worth taking a look, it's a strange and depressing sort of folk tale of a little known part of America.