Film puts a modern spin on ‘Mary, Queen of Scots’

“Mary, Queen of Scots” is an ambitious re-imagining of the Mary Stuart and Elizabeth I saga with modern flourishes and bold performances from Saoirse Ronan and Margot Robbie. But the film, for all its prestige and edginess, its lofty goals and contemporary messages, is not a particularly engrossing experience.

It’s a shame too, because most of the elements are there. The gorgeous costumes and meticulous settings are breathtaking, and they couldn’t have chosen two leads better suited to playing these women, with Ronan as Mary and Robbie as Elizabeth. They just don’t come together very well, straddling an awkward line between wanting to be both a modern referendum on the real struggles of being a female leader in the 16th century and a “Game of Thrones”-style actioner. Director Josie Rourke, who has a background in theater, certainly has a knack for grandeur and drama. But choppy editing and stilted story evolution never really do justice to what should be negotiate in an elaborate game of chess in which everyone is attempting to manipulate an unstable situation. Elizabeth tries to offer up a husband to Mary, in her own lover Robert Dudley (Joe Alwyn), as a strategic plant. But, Mary, seeing through the plan, weds another Englishman, the charismatic Lord Darnley (Jack Lowden), ensuring that her offspring would have a legitimate claim to the throne.

There are interesting ideas to explore about being a powerful woman in this time. But the script from “House of Cards” creator Beau Willimon seems to oversimplify things. He imagines a relationship that devolves mostly because of Elizabeth’s jealousy of Mary’s youth, beauty and ability to bear children. This point is hammered over and over, as Elizabeth, hearing that Mary is pregnant, gathers her skirt to just see what she would look like pregnant in silhouette. The birth scene is even more noxious, cutting back and forth from Mary in labor, to poor, sad Elizabeth creating the only thing she can — paper flowers.

The film takes enormous liberties with history, bringing the two rulers together for a face-to-face conversation, and infusing the cast with more diverse faces and themes to varying degrees of success. That conversation that apparently never happened

Liam Daniel / TNS A still from “Mary Queen of Scots.”

Liam Daniel / Associated Press This image released by Focus Features shows, from left, Ian Hart as Lord Maitland, Jack Lowden as Lord Darnley, Saoirse Ronan as Mary Stuart and James McArdle as Earl of Moray in a scene from “Mary Queen of Scots.”