The Miniaturist (2017)

The Series surfers in a lot of ways. A lot due to the source material.20th century characters thrown into a period setting. There is simply no way Nella would get over the hand she has been delt. Not in four months. The title character. An elusive magical "miniaturist" who's character doesn't deliver. She was just observing what she saw around her... A thoroughly depressing climax. Production values seemed poor in comparison to what we have become used to. I was very surprised to learn they had filmed in the Netherlands. Some hammy editing and direction. Maybe the most distracting element for me was Giving Dutch characters regional east end London acents. It completely took away from the story. Not worth watching

A beautifully paced beginning, with some excellent acting (especially from Anya Taylor-Joy), peters out following the big reveal about the marriage.Given the miniaturist seems to remain unpaid after supplying unsolicited miniatures, I really didn't understand what motivated her. (So it clearly wasn't money. Was it that she was driven, as an artist, to create her works? If so, that needed to be communicated much more clearly.)

The Miniaturist teases you with the prospect of a proper mystery, but delivers only a tedious soap opera revolving around a group of characters apparently designed by a BBC diversity commission. Plausibility and realism are clearly not the priorities here: character 1) a freed slave/household servant who doesn't act like a servant but lips off the masters of the house, standing up for his rights and dignities in a way that makes us enlightened 21st-century folk feel great, but is radically unlikely for a 17th-century black man, and probably would have got him whipped or worse. Character 2) a homosexual man who supposedly has to hide his proclivities from society at large, but in fact spends nearly all his time having sex in semi-public places, resulting in his sexuality being known by pretty much everyone in town including, 3) his young wife, who after an extremely brief period of being upset about the fact that she was deceived into marrying a gay man, realizes that their marriage is not a lie, but just "different" and happily embraces the fact that her own sexuality and opportunity for motherhood has been effectively stolen from her. 4) The gay man's sister, who has her own dark secrets, namely, sleeping with a married man and getting pregnant. And so they all form a merry band of politically-correct 17th-century heros and fight against their common enemies (all the straight, white, non-adulterating people of Amsterdam). I'm personally pretty left-wing, but as a thinking person, I can't help but find this kind of heavy-handed liberal moralizing and historically-revisionist storytelling galling and offensive. And frankly, it just gives fuel to the right-wing wackos and so is counterproductive. With some subtlety and realism, these characters could have been portrayed to much greater effect.On the upside, the visuals are lovely and the miniatures are exquisite. The performances are also solid. If you can turn your brain off while watching, you just might enjoy it.

Brilliant tale, acting, direction and design. So the BBC can still do it after all!