Movie Review: Mud…leaves its imprint

Mud has routinely been described as a ‘coming of age’ movie – I could scarcely put it better myself. It is a coming of age story about a boy who realizes the complexity of relationships and emotions; there are hardly any bangs and explosions – yet Mud leaves quite a mark as it draws to a close

Mud takes its time. You start off bleary eyed almost snoozing every now and then and the plot takes its time to develop. By the second half though, you are emotionally invested and wide awake, sometimes even holding your breath in anticipation

Not everything is explained, yet since you get emotionally invested, you get what is implied. There is an underlying layer to it all that you might have to be ponder a bit to get, but its worth it. One of the reasons I really like movies like The Social Network and The Descendants so much is because they present people as people intact with all their shades of grey. Without giving anything away, Mud accomplishes this as well, leading to an enjoyable cinematic experience.

The cinematography is breath-taking. No slick shots – just some beautiful pictures – any frame of the movie would do well as a picture postcard with perfect lighting and camera angles.

While he can be mistaken to be the hero (judging by the poster), Matthew McConaughey isn’t really the protagonist, though he does a great job of his character. That role belongs to the highly impressive Tye Sheridan who as Ellis dominates most of the screen time and does complete justice to it as well. Ellis is a pretty complex yet restrained character and Tye Sheridan does a wonderful job. All the others do a good supporting act as well. The only nagging issue is that they all have some kind of accent which gets you to miss some of the good dialogues. (PVR seems to always get it wrong as to which movies they should have subtitles and which they shouldn’t)

Mud, then, leaves its imprint. If you do end up watching it this weekend, I am pretty sure its not one of those that’ll wash off so easily. Whether such movies are your type, is another matter altogether