Mud Review

Yay it’s time to talk about Mud, a film I’ve been looking forward to watching for good few months now. This film along with The Paperboy were Yesterday was the last day it was showing at my local cinema so I HAD to watch it before it left the cinema and so I did and I am glad because it was really good and I’m going to explain why in this review.

The premise for this film is as follows:

“Two teenage boys encounter a fugitive and form a pact to help him evade the bounty hunters on his trail and to reunite him with his true love.”

The story in this film is pretty much a drama which involves Mud but is more a coming-of-age story for the character Ellis, the latter of these two stories I was not expecting. Basically what we have is two boys who venture out to an island to find a boat in a tree that they want to use for their own, however there’s a shady man living there already, he’s on the run from the law but needs food. So he strikes a deal with the two boys, if they get him food he’ll give them the boat. Along with this one of the boys has family issues and finding out the highs and lows of love and relationships. And what ensues is a series of events which are funny, emotional and just downright sad at points. One of the main themes in this film was the concept of relationships with women and how complicated they can be and how different characters in the film deal with those situations. The story in this film is pretty good, its feels realistic and believable, and even though you can see where the plot is going at times and the pacing is a bit questionable I was totally engaged from start to finish and was satisfied by the time the film was over.

The story is good, however, it really is the characters that bring this film to life. Let’s start with Matthew McConaughey as Mud, McConaughey was awesome and had magnetic performance as this questionable man who befriends these two kids because they help him out in his hour of need. Then there’s Tye Sheridan and Jacob Lofland as Ellis and Neckbone, both of them do an incredible job as these young boys who not only help Mud given his dodgy past but also have to deal with their own problems too. I especially have to give props to Tye Sheridan as Ellis, this is his film as much as Mud’s as the stuff he goes through is some really dramatic stuff for someone his age and Sheridan is really amazing at bringing his acting talents to the table.

Reese Witherspoon as Juniper was also good as the woman who was the girlfriend of Mud and had situations of her own to deal with. I can’t say I’ve seen many films with Reese Witherspoon in them but she was good here. Then there’s Sam Shepard as Tom Blankenship was a really interesting character, at first he came across as a questionable old man, but I ended up really liking his character and his interactions with Mud and the boys. Also Michael Shannon as Galen was good, this was probably the most different role I’ve seen him in because he’s usually so mean in the stuff I’ve seen him in before but I liked what I saw in this film and Shannon was entertaining, I just wish there was more of him. Joe Don Baker as King was nice, he was a character that worked from behind the shadows but had some nice relevance to the plot.Ray McKinnon and Sarah Paulson as Senior and Mary Lee (Ellis’ parents) they were great and had some wonderful and dramatic scenes in the film. And lastly Paul Sparks as Carver was great, he was a right mean guy in this film and Sparks played that to great effect in this film. And am I the only one surprised to find two actors from Boardwalk Empire in the same film together?

In conclusion Mud was a film I really liked it, while the pacing was a pad questionable at points otherwise it was a cracking with some fine performances from the cast and a story that made me care about what was going on.

Rating: 8/10 (Definitely worth a watch for the performances alone)

So have any of you seen Mud and if so what did you think of it? Sound off your comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review yo! 😀