The Execution of Mary, Queen of Scots

Execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, The (1895)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

This Edison short was one of the first movies to deal with a real event and the payoff is actually very good. Mary Stuart is taken to the chopping block where she puts her head down and has it hacked off. The special effects in the film are very well done but I'm not sure if the edit is done in a good fashion or if we just can't see it because the print quality is so shaky. Either way this is nicely done and shows that there were some violent films being made back in the day. I've read that this film was pulled from various places because people actually believed that the woman gave her life for the movie. You can't help but think what these folks would feel about certain violent movies of today.

1895 was a year of great importance in the history of cinema, the main reason for that is of course the beginning of the Lumière brothers' series of public showings of their movies. The brother's invention of the Cinematographe changed the way moving pictures were seen, as for the first time, images could be projected on a screen for an audience to see them, just like the theater. This event was a significant blow to Edison's Kinetoscope (then the most popular device used for watching moving pictures), as the Cinematographe offered a more comfortable experience when compared to the individual "peep show machine" of the Kinetoscope. In an attempt to save his invention, Edison hired Alfred Clark to make original films of a different subject matter to compete with the Cinematographe. The results were a series of representations of historical events, among them it was this movie, "The Execution of Mary Stuart, Queen of the Scots".

In its barely one minute of duration, "The Execution of Mary Stuart" presents a representation of the beheading of Mary I of Scotland (Robert Thomae), monarch of the kingdom of Scotland who was executed in 1587 because of her supposed participation in plots to assassinate the Queen of England, Elizabeth I. The strange circumstances surrounding her trial and execution have transformed the figure of Queen Mary into a legendary icon of a victim of political intrigues (some see her as a martyr), making her life an inspiration for many works of art, and this short movie represents the first time her story was portrayed in film. While historically inaccurate (the real Mary was beheaded with three blows, instead of one), the movie has a very haunting atmosphere that even today looks very realistic and solemn.

Despite having been made when Kinetoscope was in its last days, "The Execution of Mary Stuart" is a very important film for many different reasons. For starters, it was among the first movies to use trained actors, and the very first to have a man (Robert Thomae) playing a woman. Before Clark's historical movies, Kinetoscope's shorts were either moving pictures portraying everyday scenes (the Lumière would follow this format) or famous artists like Annie Oakley or Annabelle Moore performing their arts for the camera; Clark's movies changed this by having actors playing characters instead of themselves. While he didn't fully introduced theater's elements in his films (Georges Méliès and J. Searle Dawley would do that), his work was certainly groundbreaking as it was the seed of storytelling in films, and the beginning of the close relationship between theater and film.

Finally, Alfred Clark's movie introduced another interesting element to cinema that would become one of its most important features in its future years: film editing. In order to achieve a realistic beheading, Clark decided to use a simple cut to change from the actor to a dummy that could be beheaded without problem. While a very simple device (that in this modern age of effects looks painfully obvious), this meant the first use of the medium's properties to achieve an effect (that was considered so real that some thought a real person was being killed on screen). Later pioneers like Georges Méliès and Edwin S. Porter would further develop this trick in order to create their fantastic magic. Kinetoscope died shortly after the release of this film, but while it wasn't a very successful movie on its release, "The Execution of Mary Stuart" is definitely one of the most important movies of those early years of cinema. 7/10

It was okay. I just wish Edison had put more effort into convincing CGI.

all right, the execution of mary, queen of scots is certainly not the prettiest of the edison labs. films. i'm not keen on executions nor bad camera tricks and this one delivers. still, it's the first of it's kind for both, and is therefore essential viewing for anyone seriously interested in film.

now, let's get realistic for a second here. the camera trick used here is one of the first, if not the first of it's kind. apparently it shocked the audience it had in it's days, but for obvious reasons it today looks quite fake. this is also one of the first if not the first film reproducing a historical scene going for the best possible realism, a description that later became a definition for a genre. the execution wasn't very realistic historically either, though.

according to IMDb it's also the first film with trained actors. it doesn't show much ;) but it's yet another merit for this film only mildly interesting in traditional sense. like it or not, the execution of mary stuart ranks high in film history. the influence it has given to countless films after it cannot be dismissed.

I have always been a big fan of movies that has shown such gruesome situations as dismemberment and bloodshed. This movie started it all with the beheading of Mary. No blood was shed even though I love chocolate (the early special effect for blood was chocolate sauce). It was also a very nice piece of history rendered by the movie industry.