Mary, Queen of Scots, 2018

Saoirse Ronan as Mary, Queen of ScotsThere is no room for Ronan to hide in this scene. The camera stays squarely on her face as we watch it contort with the ecstasy of her first real sexual encounter.This scene in Josie Rourke’s Mary, Queen of Scots is a crucial addition to the movie orgasm canon, if only because of what comes after. Having received the best oral sex of her life, Mary (Ronan), asks her lover Henry Darnley (Jack Lowden) if she can reciprocate, and he turns her down. Talk about a royal move — she gets pleasured with no strings attached! It’s a moment designed for the female gaze, showcasing a woman’s pleasure, from her perspective.What was so great about having that moment when Henry (Jack Lowden) goes down on her is that it’s purely for her,” Ronan told Refinery29 about that moment. “That’s a sexual revelation purely for her. It’s not to perform her duty, it’s not to give anything back to anyone else or to the state. It’s for her. It was so important to see this young girl experience this pleasure, probably for the first time, and have that be a real sort of revelation. It was just another element to her humanity.”