Mary of Scotland (1936) Directed by John Ford, Leslie Goodwins
Drama / Romance / History
Film Review
Whilst the historians may cringe at its obvious pro-Stuart, anti-Tudor
bias, Mary of Scotland is a
compelling, well-staged piece of historical drama which affords
Katharine Hepburn one of her better roles. Director John Ford
appears to be more preoccupied with lighting and camerawork to create a
mood of stifling oppression than in directing the performances, which
are pretty varied in their quality. Whilst there are some
commendable contributions from the likes of Hepburn, March and
Carradine, others (notably Douglas Walton's effete Darnley) are
painfully mannered. The film is highly regarded today but it was
a commercial failure when it was first released.
Based on a play by Maxwell Anderson, this version of history portrays
Mary Stuart as a righteous martyr and Elizabeth Tudor as a conniving
paranoiac. The treatment is simplistic (both characters were far
more complex in reality than this drama suggests) but perhaps no more
so than some of Shakespeare's history plays. Interestingly, Bette
Davis had wanted to play Elizabeth in this film, but the part went to
Florence Eldridge, wife of Fredric March, who played Bothwell.
Davis got to play the virgin queen a few years later, in Michael
Curtiz's The Private Lives of
Elizabeth and Essex (1939).
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Next John Ford film: Stagecoach (1939)
Film Synopsis
In 1561, Mary Stuart, the widow of Francis II of France, makes herself two
dangerous enemies when she opts to return to Scotland. Her brother James
Stuart is in no mood to hand over the Scottish throne to her, and her cousin
Elizabeth Tudor, the Queen of England, sees her as a potential threat to
her reign. The only people that Mary can count on are her chief lieutenant,
the Earl of Bothwell, with whom she is deeply in love, and her devoted Italian
secretary, David Rizzio. Mary's only hope of securing the Scottish
crown for herself is to marry Lord Darnley, who is the man most likely to
inherit the English throne after Elizabeth.
Narrowly escaping a plot to discredit her, Mary escapes to safety with Darnley
and one year on she has a son and heir. Darnley dies in horrific circumstances
after denying that the child is his own. Forced to surrender the Scottish
throne by her enemies, Mary flees to England, expecting Elizabeth to offer
her support in her hour of need. Unfortunately, her cousin still regards
her as a dangerous rival and has no choice but to imprison her. Elizabeth
offers to spare Mary's life if she will only sign a document renouncing forever
the Stuarts' claim to the English crown. It is a demand that Mary can never
agree to...
Script: Mortimer Offner, Dudley Nichols, Maxwell Anderson (play)
Cinematographer: Joseph H. August, Jack MacKenzie
Music: Nathaniel Shilkret
Cast: Katharine Hepburn (Mary Stuart),
Fredric March (Bothwell),
Florence Eldridge (Elizabeth Tudor),
Douglas Walton (Darnley),
John Carradine (Rizzio),
Robert Barrat (Morton),
Gavin Muir (Leicester),
Ian Keith (Moray),
Moroni Olsen (John Knox),
William Stack (Ruthven),
Ralph Forbes (Randolph),
Alan Mowbray (Throckmorton),
Frieda Inescort (Mary Beaton),
Donald Crisp (Huntly),
David Torrence (Lindsay),
Molly Lamont (Mary Livingstone),
Anita Colby (Mary Fleming),
Jean Fenwick (Mary Seton),
Lionel Pape (Burghley),
Alec Craig (Donal)
Country: USA
Language: English
Support: Black and White
Runtime: 123 min
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