Mud (Matthew McConaughey) is an enigmatic stranger hiding on a muddy island in the Mississippi somewhere in the deep South. In a Huckleberry Finn-like story, two fourteen-year-old boys, Ellis (Tye Sheridan) and his friend Neckbone (Jacob Lofland), find Mud by accident when they come across a boat stranded in a tree, presumably from the last flood.

Mud befriends the boys and they find out he killed a man in Texas because he hurt his girlfriend Juniper, the love of his life.

It turns out more true than the boys first believed, when Juniper (Reese Witherspoon) suddenly shows up in town and a posse of bounty hunters, led by the father of the man Mud killed, closes in on them.

What started out as a boyish adventure for the boys quickly turns into a dangerous game of life and death.

This is story-telling at its best. We are led into the lives of ordinary people, eking out a living off the river, trying their best to be honorable, while also looking for their dreams and ideals. America on the Mississippi is far away from the America I know and it’s almost inconceivable it is the same country. Mud took me deep into that world and had me captivated for two hours and ten minutes.

Rating: ***