Film review: Mary Queen of Scots: in my end is my beginning.

Abstract

For someone who died 432 years ago, Mary Queen of Scots still has remarkable presence, not only in the large number of precise locations where she is known to have been but also in her letters and poems and the many books, plays, and film versions of her life. In the 2018 film Mary Queen of Scots , the Scottish locations are often inaccurate but they are magnificent on a big screen with Max Richter’s sumptuous musical score. With Oscar nominations for costume, make-up, and hairstyle, the film looks and sounds great. It is a complicated story for filmmakers to tell,1 but it is told well up to the point of Mary’s abdication, with many telling small features, such as the Queen talking in French to her four gentlewomen, the Four Marys, and Elizabeth I caking her face with white make-up to hide smallpox scars. In general, the film is sympathetic to both Mary and Elizabeth, who dealt the best they could …