In an interview, when Pauline Kael was asked about her "capacity to capture the quality of an actor's performance," she replied, "I think so much of what we respond to in fictional movies is acting. That's one of the elements that's often left out when people talk theoretically about movies. They forget it's the human material we go to see. A movie without actors is not, generally, a very compelling or memorable movie. There are great documentarians, of course, and directors who can make movies where we're fascinated by the whole look and feel of things, but generally we need an actor, or a group of actors, to involve us emotionally." Something tells me that she would have enjoyed writing about the performances of Tomasz Schuchardt and Sandra Drzymalska in The Doll (or Lalka), a Netflix romantic drama based on Bolesław Prus' literary classic. The six-episode series derives most of its energy and entertainment value from these two actors, who play Stanislaw Wokulski and Izabela Lecka, respectively.
When the camera is on them, The Doll reaches an intense high of emotion and ecstasy. Schuchardt and Drzymalska don't exist passively on the screen, reciting their lines with mechanical efficiency. They perform something akin to hypnosis with their sharp stares and deeply felt lines. Drzymalska's Izabela almost breaks the screen with her explosive expressions that threaten to break everything in her vicinity. She is at her best when she observes Stanislaw with a delicious mixture of contempt and eroticism, apparent indifference and subtle curiosity. Stanislaw, for his part, beholds Izabela as a gorgeous princess way out of his reach—a pipe dream. Nonetheless, he is obsessed with her so madly that his infatuation is out in the open for everyone to see. If it were up to Stanislaw, he would tightly embrace Izabela and stop time. In her presence, he becomes more awkward, more physically rigid, yet more determined to have her for himself. The two characters look at each other with such wildly contrasting feelings that their fixed, fervid stares almost poke a hole in the screen.
Stanislaw is so enamored by Izabela that he hires a prostitute named Marianna (Maria Kania) as a spy, posing as a maid, to keep an eye on Izabela and report her tastes, likes, and dislikes back to him. It also appears as if Stanislaw purposefully ruins the Lecka family's finances so that Izabela would be forced to marry him. Tomasz (Jacek Braciak), Izabela's father, plans to start a factory to pay off his debts, but someone burns the machines. He wins a horse during a card game and uses it in the races to win money, but someone sabotages the horse, and again Tomasz falls into monetary ruin. We, as well as quite a few characters in The Doll, scarcely hesitate to accuse Stanislaw of both sabotaging the horse and setting fire to the machines. Schuchardt displays Stanislaw's desperation so clearly, so palpably, that it only makes sense that he would play twisted games to make Izabela fall for him. And yet, it's difficult to truly hate Stanislaw because the love he has for Izabela is sincere and pure. That unadulterated passion redeems him in our eyes. Despite the notion that he is disrupting Izabela's family from standing on their own feet, we want this lovesick puppy to get the woman of his dreams, no matter how twisted he might be.
As a viewer, that's a very uneasy and unusual place to be in, which is why it's a bummer that The Doll walks back on this setup and sanitizes Stanislaw's craziness. The show briefly turns itself into a faux detective story that neuters the bite of the Stanislaw-Izabela dark romance in favor of a passable twist. Writers Paweł Demirski, Jagoda Dutkiewicz, and Paweł Maślona (who also serves as the director) have taken creative liberties with the source material, but most of their additions and tweaks simply lie in the range of fine and okayish. I have not read Prus' book, though based on my quick research, I found that the author infused his story with rich details regarding Polish society of that time, as well as plenty of enticing history and backstory for its diverse range of characters, which also included members of the Jewish community. The Netflix series, by comparison, seems pretty straightforward and... Netflix-y. Like recent outings such as My Brilliant Career and Lovesick, The Doll tackles women's empowerment through a familiar dramatic device: having characters scoff at progressive ideas like women, say, working in medicine or wearing trousers or other "modern, comfortable clothing."
The problem is not just that these discussions sound the same across all these Netflix series. It's also that these lines call attention to themselves by winking at the audience with a (probably unintentional) reminder that they have been written by people in the present poking the (close-minded) people of the past in the ribs. The Doll also has a thread involving a woman's magazine, but it suffers from thin, uninteresting characters who are meant to serve as a contrast to Izabela's luxurious life. It's a contrast that the show points out explicitly through gestures and dialogue, particularly in the form of scoffs and insults like "you don't have the exposure of reality," leaving no room for potent drama or creativity. The plot thread merely works theoretically as a suggestion about Izabela working for the emancipation of other women as well as her own liberty. Prus' book went deep into the backstories of its characters and made them interesting. It, for instance, talked, among other things, about Stanislaw's childhood, education, and participation in the 1863 January Uprising. Ignacy Rzecki's past and political activities, too, were detailed similarly.
The series doesn't delve into its characters' pasts with such curiosity, choosing instead to present them with simple strokes that render them fit enough for the story. What it especially manages to present successfully is an unfair society where dreamers and lovers like Izabela and Stanislaw are envied and derided simultaneously. They act on their own impulsive whims rather than following the established conventions of high society, which tries its best to reject their personal idiosyncrasies. Stanislaw struggles to speak the local tongue fluently and is mocked whenever he gives a speech, while Izabela is ridiculed by other men whenever she puts forward her progressive viewpoints. If Izabela wants to be accepted by the Ivy Magazine team, Stanislaw wants to be accepted by the Society of Polish Nobility. People scoff at Izabela's decision not to marry, and people scoff at Stanislaw when he talks about science. They might not know it, but Izabela and Stanislaw exist on the same level in their society. In some ways, they are kindred spirits. The writers do feel for them earnestly, which is why the changes they bring to the ending land satisfactorily. I think I prefer this optimistic, bittersweet finale to the bleak climax of Prus' story (then again, I have only read the summary of Prus' story). This Netflix series might not end up gaining the same classic status as the novel, though when it works, it works quite effectively. Whatever its shortcomings, the show's strengths sufficiently outweigh its negatives, making The Doll one of those rare Netflix shows that can be recommended as worth watching. Overall, I liked it, and there's a fair chance that you, too, will end up liking it. That should definitely count for something.
Final Score - [6/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
Follow @vikasonorous on Twitter
Publisher at Midgard Times