Mud (2013) ****/*****
With his first two films as a writer/director, 2007’s Shotgun Stories and 2011’s Take Shelter, Jeff Nichols quickly established himself as a filmmaker worth watching, and his lead actor, Michael Shannon, a talent worth keeping an eye on. After the depth, beauty, and artisan skill that those films displayed, pretty much all you would need to do is put Nichols’ and Shannon’s names on a marquee and I would consume whatever’s being advertised. Unfortunately, Shannon only comes back in a bit part for this third film, Mud, but when you’ve got a slimy looking Matthew McConaughey complete with chipped up hillbilly teeth taking his place as the lead, it’s kind of hard to complain.
Okay, so that’s not entirely accurate. Actually, a young actor named Tye Sheridan is the lead here, and McConaughey is the otherworldly entity at the center of the film who kicks off the forward progression of the plot. The basic story is that Sheridan’s character, a 14-year-old named Ellis, is a coming of age boy who lives with his mother and father on a river in Arkansas. His parents are having serious marital problems, his own burgeoning interest in women is providing him with more trouble than he anticipated, and he’s started to wonder if this whole romance thing might not be more trouble than it’s worth. Enter Mud (McConaughey), a wanted man with a sob story about the wrongs that have been perpetrated on him by those in power, and the lost love who he’s trying to reconnect with.
You see, his whole life Mud’s been involved with a knockout named Juniper (Reese Witherspoon), but Juniper is the type of lady who’s got a wandering eye. Their standard routine seems to be that Juniper runs away, gets involved with the wrong type of guy, and then comes running back to Mud once harm has come to her. The last time around Juniper took the routine a little too far though, and got involved with a guy who was dangerous for real. The situation led to Mud having to shoot the dude in order to protect his lady, and now he’s being hunted not only by the local authorities, but also by the guy’s crazy family and their team of bounty hunters. That’s why Ellis and his best friend, Neckbone (Jacob Lofland), found him living in a boat that got stuck up in a tree after a big flood.
What? Where would you go if you were trying to lay low?
Anyway, Mud is a sort of southern fried fairytale, just as much as it is a coming of age drama. Ellis seems to get the idea in his head that if he’s able to help these star-crossed lovers avoid their pursuers and ride off into the sunset, then all of his doubts about love and human relationships will be laid to rest and the world will be laid bare as a just, rewarding place where one can hope to build a meaningful existence. Ellis and Neckbone’s subsequent adventures in relaying communications to Juniper and gathering the necessary materials to get Mud’s boat out of the tree and in seaworthy condition wind up putting them in the path of heartless cowboys, CIA assassins, deadly cottonmouth snakes, and perhaps the most dangerous of all of life’s hazards — teenage girls looking for attention.
Like everything Nichols has made up to this point, Mud is full of evocative imagery and memorable characters, and it builds with a sense of danger and dread that you know is eventually going to explode on the screen. If someone wanted to start throwing phrases like “the new Hitchcock” around regarding his work, it would be pretty dumb, but not entirely out of the realm of reason.
Unlike his first two films though, Mud does make a few questionable moves along the way. In general, the first half builds really well and does a great job of sucking you in and getting you involved in its character’s lives, but after all of that tensions builds to a breaking point and things start going haywire, it’s possible that they might go a little too haywire. The lengths that Ellis and Neckbone go to in order to help out a convicted murderer stretches credibility to its breaking point, the amount of action movie elements that get introduced in the third act seems a bit out of place in a movie that had been largely character based to that point, and one might argue that the nature of the relationship between Mud and Juniper is ill-defined and obtuse. Seeing as we’re looking at it through the eyes of a naive tween, however, that’s one of those perceived faults that can be viewed as being purposeful.
Basically, Mud is Nichols’ first film that is a little bit hit or miss. Given the level of the performances that his actors give, it’s still an easy recommendation though. McConaughey has been on an absolute tear ever since he stopped trying to be a Hollywood leading man and started working with respected auteurs again, and his performance here keeps his streak of good work going. Sheridan proves to be an actor who has no trouble supporting the weight of a meaty dramatic film, and it would be a shock if his performance here didn’t lead to him getting a heap more work in the next few years. With actors like Ray McKinnon, Sarah Paulson, Sam Shepard, Shannon, and Lofland also giving strong performances in supporting roles, Mud becomes an easy recommendation to make just on the quality of its acting alone. But make sure that if you’re going to watch it you check out Shotgun Stories and especially Take Shelter first. They’re even more impressive.
