Mud (2013)

I am not amongst the Matthew McConaughy fans--on screen he just seems much too impressed with himself to be able to appreciate admiration from others.  Not so in this film.  He plays Mud, a man on the run, wanted in the cold blooded murder of a man who done a woman wrong.  The law and the dead man's mobster family want to exact revenge on him, so he has gone home to a place that he knows all too well.  He is living on an uninhabited island on the Mississippi River somewhere south of the Mason Dixon line in the land of Piggly Wiggly (a quick perusal of their website shows that this doesn't elinimate any Southern state on the Mississippi).

The movie is about Mud and the relationship he develops with two 14-year old boys, Ellis and Neckbone, but it is also about place.  If 'Beasts of the Southern Wild' was the poverty story of river and bayou life, this is the lower middle class side of the story.  It isn't quite as dangerous feeling as 'Winter's Bone', but the cops in this town can be bought and vigilantism is alive and well.  Lots of people live off what they can get out of the river, which in some ways is admirable and in other ways is incredibly sad and desperate.  So that is the back drop against which this story is told.

The plot itself is the least interesting part of the movie--Mud has had a life long crush on Juniper (Reese Witherspoon, who plays the role convincingly).  Juniper only has eyes for bad boys, who more often than not end up beating her up, which is when she calls Mud, who consistently saves her, only to have her start all over again with yet another man.  He sees her as his life long love, but we see what Mud's adopeted father, Tom (Sam Shepherd), sees, that as long as he hangs on to her, he is doomed.  Ellis and Neckbone know the woods almost as well as Mud, and they come upon him living in a boat that got swept up into a tree during one storm or another.  Mud treats them as his posse, and they come through for him in ways that are resourceful and impressive.  The bad guys come to town, rough up the girl, enlist some muscle, and it all comes down to a shoot out after Mud has to surface to do the right thing.  It is so well done, and McConaughy deserves some recognition for his portrayal of Mud.