Summary:
An account of Mary Stuart’s relationship with Elizabeth I, Queen of England.
My Thoughts
I’m a sucker for a good period piece. When I first saw the trailer for this film, back in the early months of 2018 with two A-list stars, both of them fresh off Oscar nominations the previous year (Ronan for “Lady Bird”, Robbie for “I, Tonya”), I had this pegged as a huge Oscar contender. The Academy tends to like period pieces as much as I do, and furthermore they seem to love Ronan and Robbie. I thought this film was a surefire bet at the Oscars. As I sat down to watch this movie there were a few aspects that I thought were close to great, but many of the scenes seemed poorly blocked and sometimes awkwardly directed, also, a lot of the dialogue seemed rather dull; it lacked the pizzazz that I’ve seen in other period pieces (like this year’s “The Favourite”). But by far the thing that I found most irritating with this film was its insistence in shoving modern themes and political agenda into the story.
This is by no means a bad movie, but it’s far from a great one.
“Your Gifts Will Be Your Downfall!”
After the death of her husband the King of France, Mary Stuart (Saoirse Ronan, “Brooklyn”) returns home to Scotland, where she starts a correspondence with Elizabeth I (Margot Robbie, forthcoming "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”) in an attempt to make a vie for the throne should Elizabeth be unable to produce an heir. As Elizabeth and Mary negotiate, their advisors use many means necessary to sway their relationship one way or the other. As Mary continuously tries for the throne, she finds herself making more and more enemies.
Well as I mentioned above, really the political agenda was what stuck out to me as the most bizarre thing in this film. There are scenes that feel almost surreally out of time in this movie, because they address modern issues almost explicitly. There are also scenes when it feels like the filmmakers are strongly implying that, though the Queens may be making the decisions, all of the bad decisions were because of influences by their male advisors and all of the good decisions were due to the Queen’s decisions. Look, I am all for furthering social issue awareness in the right context, but when a film goes out of its way to make a point that really doesn’t fit the context of the story, it does nothing but feel oddly out of place. Gender fluidity isn’t something that was really widely and openly discussed until the past few decades, let alone five hundred years ago. Also, while there might have been some closeted homosexuals in some of Mary Stuart’s close friends, I doubt she would’ve been so outspokenly approving of them in that day in age (even defending him when he has an affair with her husband- who would do that?). I have absolutely no problem with homosexuality being depicted in historical pieces, but it must fit the context and make sense with the story in order to portray the people that lived through those times the correct way. Look at some of the other recent period pieces that dealt with similar content (homosexuality during a time when that was still frowned upon by the majority of the public) like “The Favourite” or even “Lizzie”. Those films portray the situation that these people are in with a real deftness; it was hard for homosexuals to exist in those days, for them to live in constant fear of being found out… minimizing their struggle in these times is akin to “Green Book” having a white savior problem at the end. I feel like by trying to be more forward thinking, the filmmakers have insulted those who struggled through those times.
When the filmmakers continuously glorify women and vilify men, they make it incredibly apparent that their agenda they’re trying to push is more important than the story they are trying to tell. It doesn’t matter what your message is, if you’re too heavy-handed with it, it comes off as preachy and you end up repelling your audience (I felt the same way about the politics in this movie as I did with the heavy-handedness of “BlacKkKlansman”).
In most of the scenes, direction was pretty unremarkable, but in a few scenes I found myself distracted by the blocking. Probably 90% of the scenes felt like anyone could’ve directed them; none of the shots really felt like they were trying to say anything, it just felt like they were trying to get coverage. The other 10% of the scenes were somewhat confusing as to who was where. The worst example of this awkward blocking comes during one of the only battle scenes, when Ronan’s men stop a rebellion. I literally couldn’t tell who was whom for the first minute of the battle, and then by the time I had put together who was fighting for whom, the battle was over and I had to surmise what happened.
While I didn’t care for the over the top message, and I found the direction to be a bit boring, there are some really decent parts to this movie. The costume design is fantastic, and so is the hair and makeup. Robbie has a few scenes where she is covered in pox and she is practically unrecognizable. Ronan’s costuming is by far some of the best work I’ve seen this year; her blue armor in particular was stunning. It is no surprise to me that this film was nominated for only two Oscars, and those were Makeup and Costume Design. Production design was good too.
Ronan was far and away the best part of this movie. She plays Mary as strong, confident, and proud, and in doing so she’s incredibly likeable character (almost too likeable – at times they try to turn her actions into something saintly). Robbie is good in that she’s rather understated in this role; she allows Ronan to shine, while still giving a captivating performance whilst onscreen. There is something to be said about playing a supporting role like this, and I really give Robbie credit. Still, while the performances were good, I don’t think this film was close to their best work.
Verdict:
If this movie would’ve eased off the politics (it’s 2019, who am I kidding?), it probably could’ve been a better story. There were some good moments, but it never rises above a middling level movie overall. Good acting and production design can only carry a movie so far; the writing and directing for this movie needed a bit more work.
Review Written By: