Moon Film Review: Mary, Queen of Scots

Two of the Queens who have featured prominently in the life of Your Cultural Correspondent (Film) are Queen Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots. We have read many books about them and seen their joint story acted out on screen by Glenda Jackson and Vanessa Redgrave and on stage by Harriet Walter and Janet McTeer. The latter two were appearing in a production of Mr Friedrich Schiller's 'Mary Stuart'. Had we been writing reviews for The Moon at that time, we would have noted how affecting the play was and in particular these words uttered to the Scottish Queen by Mortimer:

I scarce, my liege, had numbered twenty years,
Trained in the path of strictest discipline
When led by irresistible desire
And nursed in deadliest hate to papacy,
For foreign travel, I resolved to leave
I flew through France, and bent my eager course
My country and its puritanic faith
Far, far behind me: soon with rapid speed
On to the plains of far-famed Italy.
Each image was adorned with garlands;
'Twas then the time of the great jubilee:
And crowds of palmers filled the public roads;
As if all human-kind were wandering forth
Into the streets of Rome.
What was my wonder,
In pilgrimage towards the heavenly kingdom.
The tide of the believing multitude
Bore me too onward, with resistless force,
As the magnificence of stately columns
In the fair world of wonders it had framed.
Rushed on my sight! the vast triumphal arches,
The Colosseum's grandeur, with amazement
Struck my admiring senses; the sublime
Creative spirit held my soul a prisoner
What were my feelings, then, as I approached
I ne'er had felt the power of art till now.
The church that reared me hates the charms of sense;
It tolerates no image, it adores
But the unseen, the incorporeal word.
The threshold of the churches, and within,
My captivated sense in real presence!
Heard heavenly music floating in the air:
While from the walls and high-wrought roofs there streamed
Crowds of celestial forms in endless train—
When the Most High, Most Glorious pervaded
And when I saw the great and godlike visions,
With which the kings of earth adorn themselves!
The Salutation, the Nativity,
The Holy Mother, and the Trinity's
Descent, the luminous transfiguration
And last the holy pontiff, clad in all
The glory of his office, bless the people!
Oh! what is all the pomp of gold and jewels
For not of earthly moulding are these forms!
He is alone surrounded by the Godhead;
His mansion is in truth an heavenly kingdom,

Sadly, this great piece of conversionary text does not appear in the recently released 'Mary, Queen of Scots'. What does appear are the two central performances, Miss Saoirse Ronan as the titular monarch and Miss Margot Robbie as her English equivalent. While they are both very good, it is surely  Miss Robbie's magnificent portrayal of the first Elizabeth that deserves the greatest plaudits. Despite the title, it is her film really even though the fate of her rival does pose us one question: how many of the audience would have understood the significance of what Mary, Queen of Scots was wearing at the moment she met her destiny?