Last night, a select group of Aussies had their first glimpse at Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights, starring Queenslanders Jacob Elordi and Margot Robbie at the film’s premiere in Sydney. While the stars, and the many celebrity guests, dazzled on the carpet, the film itself is drawing starkly mixed reviews.
For some, the film was a sizzling, heart-wrenching visual feast. For others, it was a garish, sexually explicit and glossed-over re-telling of a beloved classic novel.
And, from the reviews so far, it seems, there’s not any in between.
As discussions and reviews heat up online, the TV WEEK team found themselves divided, too.
For some of us — myself included — Wuthering Heights was a generous, visually beautiful treat. We revelled in the chemistry of the genetically-blessed Aussie leads, the glory of the vast, misty moors and the striking costuming.
“I was mesmerised,” said TV WEEK writer Lucy Croke.
“The performances are magnetic. Margot is electric, Jacob brooding in all the right ways. The visuals are stunning, the costumes impeccable, and the soundtrack elevates every longing glance and windswept confrontation. There are even a few unexpectedly hilarious moments that cut through the intensity at just the right time. And the ending? Devastating. I cried like a Love Island star whose just been dumped from the villa.”
While some of us were enraptured by the spectacle of it all, others weren’t able to see past the moments where the original storyline was changed or tweaked.
“I found it a little bit tedious and bland,” TV WEEK’s picture editor Julie Hankinson admitted.
“The back story is really important for Cathy and Heathcliff. It wasn’t as simple as Martin Clune’s Earnshaw being a gambler and a drunk. Why would they exclude Hindley?”
Meanwhile, TV WEEK’s Deputy Editor Tamara Cullen found herself bored — despite how beautiful she found the film.
“Visually, it was stunning. The costumes? Stunning. Margot and Jacob’s acting? Stunning. But the character development? But it was lacking in character development – I wanted more. I was left with too many questions,” she admitted.
“I’ve never read Wuthering Heights and I did still enjoy it, but I think they rushed the second half.”
When the trailer first hit social media, the internet was enamoured by how sexually charged it was. You know, lingering, suggestive shots of egg whites and heaving bosoms.
However, if you ask me or Woman’s Day Associate Editor, Wade Sellers, Wuthering Heights wasn’t as raunchy as it was cracked up to be.
“Asthetically, it was beautiful and I loved the soundtrack,” he said.
“But being a MASSIVE fan of Emerald Fennell’s other films, Saltburn and Promising Young Woman, I was expecting more provocation – and horniness! I wanted more!”
Why have the reviews been so mixed so far?
The main factor seems to be whether viewers have actually read the book.
For literary purists, the sexually charged energy, simplified storyline and whitewashed version of Fennell’s Wuthering Heights feels like a stretch too far. Even as I was leaving the theatre, I heard a couple proclaim that the film was a “desecration” that would “make Emily Brontë roll in her grave”.
Online there have been critiques that the costuming doesn’t reflect the time period, that Margot Robbie was far too old to be cast as Cathy, who is a teenager in most of the book, and that the marketing of the film as a sexually-fuelled romance doesn’t do the depth of the story justice — especially one that didn’t have that much sex in it in the first place.
While they’re all valid critiques, it seems that it’s the casting of Jacob Elordi as Heathcliff — and it’s wider ramifications on the meaning of the text — that has audiences both outraged and scratching their heads.
The Wuthering Heights casting controversy, explained
Despite Jacob Elordi’s notable acting skills, his casting as Heathcliff ignores the character’s ambiguous ethnicity in the original story.
While Heathcliff is not explicity labelled as a person of colour, Brontë describes him as being “dark-skinned,” and emphasises that he is not a local Englishman. His description in the novel is one way of signalling to the reader that he is an outsider both in class and in race, making his feelings of alienation intensify throughout the story.
Admittedly, it’s not the first time a white actor has taken on the role (Lawrence Olivier in 1939 and Ralph Fiennes in 1992), but for fans of novel, the casting automatically strips Heathcliff of that extra level of otherness that Brontë initially prescribed him.
So, should I watch Wuthering Heights?
In short: Yes.
Whether you swoon, roll your eyes, or gasp at the twists or the simplified storytelling, Wuthering Heights is one to watch — even if you just want to join the conversation.
Wuthering Heights is in cinemas now.
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