Movie: Mud
Director: Jeff Nichols
Cast: Mathew McConaughey, Tye Sheridan, Jacob Lofland and Reese Witherspoon
Rating: ****
Mud can be perceived from two standpoints. The first point of view is of the vulnerability of men, the craving to be loved by everybody around them and the second one is about love seen through the eyes of a teenage protagonist, Ellis. It begins as an encounter of two teenage boys with a man running away from law, waiting to be reunited with his girlfriend, and soon turns into a story of men wrestling with emotions, all in the name of love.
At one point in the film, Ellis father warns, “you can’t trust love”. However, contrary to this line, Ellis sets out on a mission to reunite a couple who are believed to be in love, but don’t have the confidence to meet eye-to-eye and save their sagging relationship.
Based on the aforementioned line about love by Ellis’s father, “Mud” allows viewers to form different perception about love, but what it finally achieves in enlightening us is far more convincing than debatable. For many, it might appear as though Jeff Nichols takes a chauvinistic position, accusing women of cheating their opposite sex with a powerful weapon called love, but in reality the film only tickles you psychologically with growing sense of love’s importance.
Mud is the coming-of-age drama of two teenagers, Ellis and Neckbone, best pals, who have been raised amidst troubled familial relationship. Neckbone has never seen his parents and he stays with his uncle, while Ellis’ parents are on the verge of ending their marriage.
They encounter an outlaw, played by Mathew McConaughey, on an island, living in a small washed-up boat. Mathew is Mud, a murderer hoping to reunite with his beloved Juniper, who even though loves Mud, believes she can’t live with him forever. Ellis and Neckbone aid Mud in the meeting of Juniper, but in the process realize the true colors of love and the emotional baggage it comes with.
Jeff crafts characters we want to care about despite their flaws. These characters take us beyond the story, embracing a gamut of emotions concealed within each one of them. Even though women are the central metaphor of the film, focus of the film lies on the experience one draws from love across different age groups. While love for Mud was to reunite with Juniper; for Ellis, it was to see his parents love each other again.
The film is backed by flawless performances of the leading cast. It’s so much fun to watch Mathew McConaughey supersede his own performances with every new film. His last five films, which include “The Lincoln Lawyer”, “Bernie”, “Killer Joe”, “The Paperboy” and “Magic Mike”, have turned out to be the best films of his career.
Mathew as Mud breathes life into the character. He masquerades his funny mannerism with strong and complex emotional trauma. We see spurts of it at regular intervals, but he never lets that side take over him. This indie gem is also salvaged by brief yet powerful performances of Sam Shepard and Michael Shannon.