The McConaissance continues in Jeff Nichols’ deft retelling of a great American story.

This week Hollywood’s finest have been sipping champagne and indulging their vanity at the world’s premier film festival. But trade glamour for grime and Mud will show you something honestly beautiful.

Born into a dying way of life, Ellis (Tye Sheridan) and Neckbone (Jacob Lofland) get a real boy’s own adventure when they encounter the enigmatic Mud (Matthew McConaughey) living in an improbable boat stuck in a tree. As the boys befriend him and bring the emaciated stranger cans of beans, it transpires that Mud is not only on the run from state troopers but also a group of vengeful hitmen. As if that weren’t enough, he’s simply trying to reunite with his girlfriend, Juniper (Reese Witherspoon). Sheridan steals the show as the crafty yet innocent Ellis who, whilst his parents are breaking up, is inspired by Mud’s stories of survival and romance. Our tragic hero is filled with youthful optimism and he sets out to engineer a happy-ending.

We get unmissable overtones of Huckleberry Finn that fuel a persistent concern with the nature of masculinity and the transition from boy to man, tactfully using the old To Kill a Mockingbird trick of seeing adult problems through the eyes of a child. There’s even a degree to which Mud is an ode to the South. It definitely exhibits a romanticised view of traditional American freedom (Mud’s two possessions of worth are, by his own admission, his shirt and his pistol) of the sort that works as powerfully in cinema as it doesn’t in real life.

Despite the contractual obligation to whip his top off in at least one scene, McConaughey again transcends the shallowness of most of his previous films, continuing his form from Killer Joe and The Paperboy. We are in fact treated to an array of proficient performances, all with intriguing amounts of texture and depth. There’s even a delightful cameo-ish role from Michael Shannon as Neckbone’s Uncle, who Nichols has now established a fruitful working relationship with (see Take Shelter) and will soon become as popular as he deserves playing General Zod in the upcoming Superman re-reboot Man of Steel.

Overall, Mud winds its way down the Mississippi river at a pleasantly laidback pace and with terse dialogue all delivered in that sonorous Southern drawl. But for a protracted finish there’s great rhythm in its composition, as well as great lyricism. Adam Stone’s cinematography shows a Malicky eye for the sublime and Nichols creates a masterfully coherent aesthetic by playing off the rusty suburbs with the awesome, screen-straddling river.

Over at Cannes it’s all sparklingly chic and you could be forgiven for wanting in but I urge you, give up the Gatsby, and get stuck in the Mud.