It Is Never Too Late to Mend (1911)

It Is Never Too Late to Mend is a 1911 Australian feature-length silent film written and directed by W. J. Lincoln. It was based on a stage adaptation of the popular 1865 novel It Is Never Too Late to Mend: A Matter-of-Fact Romance by Charles Reade about the corrupt penal system in Australia. The movie was called "certainly one of the best pictures ever taken in Australia." The 1911 film is considered a lost film. The novel was filmed again in 1913 and in 1937 (the latter film being the definitive version starring Tod Slaughter as the evil squire). The film was made by the Tait family, who also made the first Australian feature film, The Story of the Kelly Gang. The Taits went on to make several more films with Lincoln, including The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (1911), The Luck of Roaring Camp (1911), Called Back (1911), The Lost Chord (May 1911), The Bells (1911) and The Double Event (1911). This was Lincoln's first film in a rather short career, as he died soon after in 1917 in Sydney, Australia at age 47.