Call me a snob, but I'm always reassured when a big new show starts to get some publicity, and it's based on a celebrated novel. Sure, there's nothing stopping showrunners from accidentally butchering a literary classic, but it tends to be a good foundation from which to build, if they have a brilliant story to adapt.
That's exactly how you'd describe Isabel Allende's The House of the Spirits, which is now coming to Amazon Prime Video as a Spanish-language show that could become something of a sensation if it matches the success of the source novel. It has a first trailer, now, and it's immediately obvious that this show will not be compromising in terms of its ambitions.
The show will tell us the story of the Trueba family over the course of generations, starting with one gifted young girl who has premonitions that lead her to accept a life she might not actually love living. We'll spool forward through time as the family's fortunes and trials give us a window into the way Chile, the country it's based in, is changing.
It's a story that brings in some famous figures, weaving its way through real-life history while telling a tale that at times blends the fantastical and the real, but at its core are a series of remarkable women who have things to learn from those who came before them. In fact, it's pretty obvious from this trailer that things will get pretty heavy for basically all of them before the show's done.
What'll be reassuring to fans of the novel is that it looks like Amazon isn't cutting corners when it comes to this adaptation. The sets, costumes and cast are all pretty immaculate from the looks of things, and it's rare to see one show offer up so many distinctive and different settings in one go.
It will also be fascinating to see if we're shown the story chronologically, or whether it'll jump back and forth in time to tease out our understanding of the characters more gradually. I'm loathe to investigate how the novel's structure, since I have every intention of reading it at some point. Regardless, the show will be streaming from 29 April, in about a month's time.
