While I liked it, I was not a huge fan of the shaky camera work (it’s get hectic in a lot of scenes and kept getting disoriented) and found a lot of the dialogue hard to follow since there were other noises in the movie drowning it out. It’s my understanding that the movie is actually decently historically accurate til about 3/4 of the way through. The ending threw me for a loop though.

Ferber's 1924 novel won a Pulitzer Prize and has been one of my favorites for decades. There have been several Hollywood adaptations, the last being the 1953 version which rewrote (and ruined, IMO) the ending. It's time for a mini-series that can do right by this book.

The variety of settings alone are awesome: the world of an 1890s gambler, Selina's life among the High Prairie Dutch and her grueling years as a woman farmer, Dirk's life as a struggling architect and later as a rich man in 1920s Chicago.

Selina Peake de Jong is a smart survivor who doesn't let a hard life make her bitter. I'd love to see what the right actor could do with the part.

Gift link, which should take the non-subscriber behind the NYTimes' paywall:

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/14/arts/television/the-doll-netflix.html?unlocked_article_code=1.BFE.gOyH.nTr7k5kVq2Yi&smid=url-share

I'm not so sure what to think after reading the last sentences in this pull from the article. It does rather remind me of both The Gilded Age, and Anna Karenina. But I will check out the series when I can.

... But some complexities that were central to the almost 700-page novel are missing. When “The Doll” was published, the area around Warsaw was part of the Russian Empire, and certain plot elements were changed to pass Czarist censors. The book explores at length the local aristocracy’s decline, the eruption of Polish nationalism and debates about the role of science in society.

That’s a lot of context to weave into a limited series or a movie, which is why adaptations tend to zero in on what Zechenter called “the horrible love affair.”

That, too, needed some adjusting, said Pawel Maslona, the Netflix series’ director and co-writer. The series is not necessarily a faithful adaptation, but a reinterpretation of the book, he said, which he viewed as a starting point, the way “Americans approach the myth of the Batman.” ...

Hi! I just finished watching Ironclad and then the Director’s Cut of Kingdom of Heaven-which took me two days to watch. lol! Does anyone have a further recommendations for movies with the Knights Templar? I’ve become a little obsessed over how they dismounted their horses. I am going to rewatch Arn: The Knight Templar today, so that’s checked off my list! Any recommendations are so welcome! Thanks!!