Customer Reviews

Prisoner of Shark Island (The Ford at Fox Collection)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"The Prisoner of Shark Island" is the story of one Samuel Mudd, a Maryland physician. The good doctor is ably played by Warner Baxter. After assassinating President Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth hurt his leg jumping from a balcony. Eluding the Law, JWB called on Mudd, who set the leg without knowing Booth's true identity. The pursuing Fed troops treat Mudd as a conspirator and he is sentenced to life in a military stockade. The "trial" is an unvarnished martial law kangaroo court. The "Shark Island" here is actually Dry Tortugas Island, off the coast of Key West, FL. PSI deals with the efforts of Mudd and his wife to win exoneration. There is excellent work here, especially by Gloria Staurt as a fiercely loyal wife standing by her man, and Harry Carey Sr. as the prison commandant. In PSI, all the prison guards are African American. They receive interesting treatment, given the historical setting of both the Civil War and climate of mid 1930s, when PSI was made. A good review doesn't reveal endings but the one here is thoroughly satisfying. One may wish to have a tissue handy. Even in the 1930s, John Ford could be sentimental! This reviewer benefited from a brand new CD, clear and sharp. PSI is one of those oldies which are not over shown/overexposed. Amazoners are urged to make an effort to view it. Highly recommended!

The film begins with the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln and John Wilkes Booth jumping on to the stage and making his escape out the back of the theater. In jumping from the balcony, Booth breaks his leg and soon needs medical attention. In the movie he asks for directions to a local doctor and appears unannounced at the home of Dr. Samuel Mudd, who, of course (without the Internet & cable TV) has not yet heard of the assassination. He treats Booth and keeps him overnight until he can travel again. The authorities trace Booth's escape to Mudd's estate and arrest him for being an accomplice. He is tried in what appears to be somewhat of a kangaroo court and sent to Shark Island Prison in the Florida Keys. He tried to escape once, unsuccessfully. A violent outbreak of Yellow Fever in which he heroically saves the lives of many of the prisoners while risking his own, convinces his accusers to rethink his guilt. The question is whether Dr. Mudd was an innocent bystander as the movie depicts or was he, in fact, part of the Booth conspiracy. This movie is well done and entertaining and is a terrific introduction to the whole story of John Wilkes Booth and the conspiracy theories. Like the JFK assassination debate, was this a lone gunman or a conspiracy much larger? A fascinating subject. www.lusreviews.blogspot.com

When John Wlikes Booth assassinated President Lincoln he jumped to the stage from Lincoln's private box and broke his leg. This movie is about Doctor Mudd who treated Booth's leg when he was on the run from authorities. Mudd was arrested, convicted, and sentenced to prison on an island fortress in the Florida Keys. This is the story of his life. Mudd maintained his innocence throughout the ordeal but the truth is only known to Mudd himself. Good story, well acted but somewhat depressing. Worth a look.

20th Century Fox presents "THE PRISONER OF SHARK ISLAND" (1936) - (96 min/B&W) -- Starring: Warner Baxter, Gloria Stuart, Claude Gillingwater, Arthur Byron, John Carradine & Harry Carey

Directed by John Ford

In 1865 Dr. Samuel Mudd (Warner Baxter), a known Confederate sympathizer, sets the broken leg of a mud-caked stranger who stumbles into his home. The injured man turns out to be John Wilkes Booth (Francis McDonald), and Mudd is accused of conspiring to murder President Lincoln. Sentenced to hang with the genuine conspirators, Mudd finds his sentence commuted to life imprisonment at the very last moment. He is shipped to Shark Island, a brutal penal colony. Subject to the cruelties of a guard Sgt. Rankin (John Carradine) who hates Mudd because of his "complicity" in Lincoln's death, the doctor suffers the torments of the damned, while back home his wife, Peggy (Gloria Stuart) campaigns desperately to get her husband pardoned. During a Yellow Fever breakout on Shark Island, Dr. Mudd performs heroically to save the survivors. For his humanitarian efforts, Mudd is finally released and reunited with his wife.

An almost unbelievable but true story ... well told by the maestro John Ford

Dr. Samuel Mudd's story was retold in the Hellgate (1952), with Sterling Hayden as the (fictional) doctor. Also worth a view.

BIOS:
1. John Ford [aka: John Martin Feeney] Director)
Date of Birth: 1 February 1894, Cape Elizabeth, Maine, USA
Date of Death: 31 August 1973, Palm Desert, California, USA (stomach cancer)

2. Warner Baxter
Date of Birth: 29 March 1889 - Columbus, Ohio
Date of Death: 7 May 1951 - Beverly Hills, California

3. Gloria Stuart
Date of Birth: 4 July 1910, Santa Monica, California
Date of Death: 26 September 2010, Los Angeles, California

4. Claude Gillingwater
Date of Birth: 2 August 1870 - Louisiana, Missouri
Date of Death: 2 November 1939 - Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California

5. Harry Carey
Date of Birth: 16 January 1878 - The Bronx, New York
Date of Death: 21 September 1947 - Brentwood, California

6. John Carradine
Date of Birth: 5 February 1906 - New York City, New York, USA
Date of Death: 27 November 1988 - Milan, Italy

Mr. Jim's Ratings:
Quality of Picture & Sound: 4 Stars
Performance: 4 Stars
Story & Screenplay: 4 Stars
Overall: 4 Stars [Original Music, Cinematography & Film Editing]

Total Time: 96 min on DVD ~ 20th Century Fox ~ (December 4, 2007)

Another great movie! I also saw this movie as a child. Old movies are a hobby of mine. The new movies are not as good as the old ones.

Seen as a drama, this is a satisfying film by the great John Ford, set in the aftermath of President Lincoln's assassination. John Wilkes Booth, on the lam after fleeing Ford's Theater, visited Maryland country doctor Samuel Mudd, who set Booth's broken leg. Caught up in the manhunt for the other conspirators, Dr. Mudd was sentenced to life in prison by a military court, and he was sent to Fort Jefferson in Florida's Dry Tortugas to serve his time. In the 1936 film, there's good acting by Warner Baxter as Dr. Mudd, and John Carradine gives an over-the-top performance as a cruel jailer.

Nunnally Johnson's screenplay addressed some themes -- lynching, public pressure and emotion, command influence on a court, and so on -- always worth contemplating. Given the recent controversy over military tribunals for terrorists, the film provides some food for thought.

How accurate, however, was the screenplay? Did the military court railroad Mudd? The screenplay omits evidence that Dr. Mudd had met Booth some months earlier, and that he may have been aware of the conspiracy. The film portrayed him as completely innocent. Dr. Mudd's case has prompted a great deal of historical research and a recent review by the Board for the Correction of Military Records. His sentence, however, has never been overturned.

The film, then, provides an interesting case study of "Hollywood" vs. "history," and this could be an excellent subject for a high school or college history paper, asking questions like these: Did Mudd know the conspirators? Should he have been tried in a civilian court? How fair was the military trial? How did "The Prisoner of Shark Island" continue the "lost cause" narrative of the Civil War, and the parallel denial of rights for African Americans?

Finally, a parental advisory: To this viewer the treatment of African American characters, mostly troops assigned as guards at the military prison, shows the attitudes and stereotypes of the 1930s. The film, then, is not only about 1865. It's about 1936 too.

-30-

Excellent early John Ford movie and it was good to see John Carradine pop up-he was usually one of Ford's players in his stock company anyhow.
But Mudds tale as this movie tells it??
So syrupy and sentimental that you may have to brush your teeth afterwards.
IMO, Mudd was guilty.
He knew it was JWB.
Don't forget, Mudd just missed doing the 'rope dance' by a 5-4 decision.
Read Steer's 'His Name Is Still Mudd' if you still have doubts.
But by all means watch this movie!!!
One of Ford's seldom seen but enjoyable works!!

This is less a review and more a comment that I await the release of the DVD on this long-forgotten John Ford film about Dr. Mudd. Let me announce my bias and interest. I am author of the book "The Union vs. Dr. Mudd," originally published in 1964, due to be reprinted by the University Press of Florida in the spring of 2008, well in time for celebrations in 2009 related to the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birthday. It is fitting and proper that the film has been scheduled for release in a DVD format in advance of the reprint edition of my book. Was Dr. Mudd guilty or innocent in the conspiracy connected with the Lincoln assassination? Historians differ on this fact. You can make up your own mind after seeing the film and later reading the book. I'll place my order with Amazon.com in time for the December 4 release.

A film dealing in part with a subject seldom touched upon in Hollywood; in this case, the military tribunals which passed judgment upon those who played even insignificant roles in one of history's greatest tragedies- and always the verdict was the same. Guilty, regardless of the facts.
It may be worth pointing out that this is a movie from the 1930s, and it's stereotypical portrayal of African-Americans was no doubt intended to win the favor of theater goers of that era. Keep this in the back of your mind as you view this.
All in all, a good movie. Not a great one, but a good one.