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Recently the movie The Favourite came out about two female characters struggling against each other in historical UK settings. Now there’s this one too. Perhaps there’s something in the water? Although this particular movie is far along the lines of Elizabeth or even a little Outlaw King in its Scottish ways, with a few touches of ‘extra’ dramatization.
Mary Queen of Scots comes from first time director Josie Rourke, adapting a true life story from the book ‘Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart’ by John Guy. The movie starts in the year 1560, while Mary (Saoirse Ronan), recently widowed from her marriage to a French monarch, returns to her homeland of Scotland. She was effectively the Queen of Scotland, without a husband or heir, which certainly was an unstable position.
At the same time, Queen Elizabeth (Margot Robbie) is dealing with her own issues trying to lead the country, despite being pushed to marry and have an heir herself. There is an immediate danger from Mary, her sort of cousin, who had a more direct line to becoming heir to the throne of England than anyone other than Elizabeth herself. Thus there’s potential conflict, as these two Queens in a world of Kings are forced to fight against each other, often through intermediaries.
Elizabeth’s world is shown with a few key figures, like her confidante Elizabeth Hardwick (Gemma Chan) and her chief advisor William Cecil (fellow Aussie Guy Pearce). Gemma Chan is one of the several interesting examples of colour blind casting in this movie, and I don’t really have an issue with it, as the race of any of these people isn’t really commented on in a way that affects the plot. It’s a good way to have a more diverse cast in these historical dramas, which tend to be fairly monochromatic.
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But Elizabeth’s perspective is only a small portion of this movie, the majority resting with Mary and her struggles. She must try and deal with dissidents, pushed by religious anger against Catholics and ‘Papist’ from John Knox (David Tennant), a prominent Scottish Protestant cleric. Her younger brother keeps trying to undermine, while she pursues her own potential marriage prospects.
And the history just goes. There are a few dramatizations for the sake of keeping things interesting, exaggerations, and a few falsehoods. Par for the course for this sort of thing. The machinations and drama are interesting enough, showing these two Queens fighting internally and externally, forced to be rivals when they don’t really want to be — naturally there’s a strong feminist message that permeates everything.
For a first time director, the movie flows quite well, although I think it’s helped by veteran cinematographer John Mathieson too with the visual look and feel. The story itself is fine for what it is, and the decisions made are also okay, but not great. The real strength here is the shining acting from these two lead actresses, with Saoirse Ronan dominating most of the movie. She’s fantastic, even if her accent wasn’t always quite there — her natural Irish brogue sometimes slipped through.
This was almost a great movie, but it shows the potential of what it could’ve been. It’s still worth seeing for the acting alone, although the costumes and production design are pretty good too. I do prefer The Favourite over this although that one is quite a different movie altogether.
Mary Queen of Scots has a run time of 2 hours 4 minutes and is rated R for some violence and sexuality.
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