WAIPAWA THEATRE

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 84, 26 April 1937, Page 3

WAIPAWA THEATRE

"Prisoner of Shark Island" Witfi a sweep of realistic power probably never before approacfied by motion pictures, 20tfi Century Fox brings to tfie screen in "Tfie Prisoner of Sfiark Island," sfiowing at Waipawa to-nigfit, tfie true story of tfie most tragie iigure in America's history. He is Dr. Samuel Alexander Mudd, long condemned as one of the Lincoln conspirators, and who now, in the light of facts rovealed in the picture, appears as a man unjustly sentenced to a living death. Warner Baxter is the leading player of this drama, which opens after the CiVil War with the assassination of Lincoln. John Wilkes Booth, whose leg was broken in the leap to the stage, flees into Maryland to receive aid from a sisnple country doctor. When the fury of the nation over this crime is unleashed, Baxter is arrested, tried with Booth 's accomplices and sent to an unknown fate on Shark Island, a fortressprison on a sun-baked reef in the Caribbean. Passionately hated by the men who guard him, degraded, beat.en, chained to his cell, Baxter attempts to eseapc, but is recaptured. With the medical officer sick, and yellow fever raging, tlie commander of the garrison turns to Baxter as his last desperate resort. How he copes with rebellious soldiers, forces fearful ship captains to bring him supplies, and finally wins the gratitude of the men of Shark Island and freedom for himself is revealed in tho astouuding, action-Mled climax o^" the picture.