The Miniaturist

[Slartybartfast]

Quite good.
very artistic.

“The main character of the title, The Miniaturist, doesn’t appear a huge amount in the book and we felt that that was a slight oversight”.

That's quite a criticism of the book.

I loved it. I haven't read the book though.

That's what I thought, SwedishEdith - and really rather arrogant. So was the thing about Johannes not explaining about the sugar being 'not quite right for this story'. Surely it's an author's decision what is right for the story. I'm quite OK with a TV producer deciding to adapt a story because they think it will work better for. TV audience, but how arrogant to suggest that they're improving on the original.

Struggled with the book and its very abrupt ending. the adaptation was beautifully done but very slow and, like the book, didn't actually seem to have a proper ending or an explanation of who the Miniaturist was or why they were doing what they were doing.
Actor playing Johannes reminded me of Hugh Laurie which was off putting.

I thought the ending was perfect. A new household comprised of people who would have been oppressed, yet who would be liberated by Johannes' money.

Just what he would have wanted because he loved them all.

Just sad he had to die.

I liked the ending too. Both Johannes and Marin gone. A new start out of the dysfunction.

I expect Nella would become an ace businesswoman.

What would they have done about baby Thea? Pretend she'd been left on the doorstep? Say that she was Cornelia and Otto's? It doesn't seem like a noblewoman's illegitimate baby would be well-treated by society, but maybe I'm wrong.

I found the ending disappointing. I couldn't really see the point of the miniaturist at the end. Shame, as I enjoyed the first episode.

But I did think baby Thea was such a beautiful baby!

I loved it but was rather baffled by the ending. Especially who is going to raise Thea? Cornelia and Otto, Nelly and Otto, all 3 of them? And I so wanted to know more about the Miniaturist’s motives and her gift. But other than her alluding to her ‘feeling’ things we never got to find out. It seems like the ending is up to the reader. Will Nelly, Otto and Cornelia start a business empire and raise baby Thea together or will Nella meet a new partner and they take over the sugar business and have their own family. Or something completely different. I do like a book to have a ‘proper’ ending because I’m hopeless at reading between the lines or working out what might happen in future.

Nella. My predictive text does not seem to like this name.

Not entirely satisfying ending but lovely to watch and good to see something a bit different. I haven't read the book.

Wonder if the actors got to keep their own little dolls!

I read the book (I agree it's very slow) and am enjoying the first part (I recorded it).

It is right with the atmosphere, costumes and the mysteriousness .

One thing that struck me , and should 've struck me in the book was that boiling hot bath that Marin takes to try to abort the baby. Did they have tapped water that would have been that hot in the bedrooms? Cornelia would've been dashing up and down the stairs to fetch it surely? Also a house that size would definitely have had more servants.

Just read that the actors did not get to keep the little dolls of themselves!

Just watched. I don't recall Marin dying in the book!! Mind you I didn't like it (for all the reasons stated above).

Thought the descriptions in the book were very good. This showed well visually. I too thought a lot of scenes were posed like paintings.

I enjoyed it but what started out as genuinely novel and intriguing became a bit humdrum and not even believable within its own world

It was beautifully shot

I loved the book and the adaptation - especially the cast and the costumes. A good winter's evening show.

Loved it, especially the shots of Amsterdam. Kept wondering how I half knew the tale but a quick google showed me it was a Book at Bedtime read. Ahh, so that was it.was beginning to think I was clairvoyant too

First part great, second part major disappointment....tension lost, and story lines fizzling out or concluding clunkily.

Caught up with part 2 last night.
I thought they could pass the baby off as Cornelia and Ottos.
problem solved.

agree about the flemish /dutch masters which was what was so appealing about the programme.

Does anyone have a male counterpart who enjoyed it. My DH sat with me to watch it but generally kept looking at his phone and then enquiring whether anything had happened. Which it hadn't, to be fair.However, he did announce that he thought Johannes was gay within about 10 minutes, largely because Johannes didn't seem to want to shag Nella immediately, so that didn't come as much of a shock to him...

I have read the book and found I ended up skimming large bits but did think the detail of Marin's room and the church service helped a bit. Despite Johannes' ending, the other Amsterdammers didn't seem as vile on TV as in the book. And I thought there was more they could have shown of the other couple (whose names have suddenly escaped me) and the bit where the poor dog is killed is better in the book as I felt Jack Phillips was underplayed. But I did like the relationship between Nella and Johannes : that was improved upon I felt .

I totally switched off at anything about the sugar on TV as I remembered how boring that was in the book : what was explained about the sugar which wasn't in the book??

I do wish BBC would go back to doing a good Dickens. The last brilliant adaptation on telly was Bleak House.

DH enjoyed it. He’s not read the book, I have.

I vividly remember the sugar cone descriptions in the book and was disappointed when Nella found them and walked through the room with them all in. Such a big build up with the secret third key, I think they could’ve made her discovery of all the cones, which ones were rotting etc much more atmospheric.

Cornelia looked very different to what I had imagined from the book.

Marin and Nella actors excellent.

I think meeting the Miniaturist was wrong as the whole point of not is that it is sinister. There wasn’t enough about the meeting to explain it or make it interesting, so it just removed the sinister feel of the book without adding anything.

DH really enjoyed it. I did too, more than the book, which we read for book group. All in the group said the non-explanation of the miniaturist 's premonitions was annoying, but I agree her scene in the drama didn't really work either.

I think for the baby, if Cordelia didn't want to marry Otto, he could say he got married while he was away, but his wife died so he has to bring Thea up alone.
I quite liked the explanation at the end, but then I haven't read the book.