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Emerald Fennell’s next film is another adaptation of Wuthering Heights, starring Margot Robbie And Jacob Elordi

Seems pretty superfluous after Arnold's masterpiece

therewillbeblus wrote: Tue Sep 24, 2024 5:43 pm Emerald Fennell’s next film is another adaptation of Wuthering Heights, starring Margot Robbie And Jacob Elordi

Seems pretty superfluous after Arnold's masterpiece

Maybe it can be the second adaptation to be set in feudal Japan

Not going to happen, but I think Fennell would be a great fit for a high school set classics adaptation come back.

knives wrote: Tue Sep 24, 2024 5:57 pm Not going to happen, but I think Fennell would be a great fit for a high school set classics adaptation come back.

That's a great idea

I imagine the only reason anyone's clamouring to make Wuthering Heights these days is so they can lean into the racial aspect that dominates modern reactions to the novel, even tho', unlike Othello, there's very little of it in the text itself.

Personally I want to see someone turn the book into a horror film full of brutal passion and phantasmagoria. It's my favourite Victorian novel, but almost no one seems to read it as this frighting, elemental, otherworldly fantasy. People tend to see it as a heartrending romance mixed with social issues. But Heathcliffe is more gothic villain than romantic hero, and Cathy this wild tempestuous figure.

If she wants to differentiate this version, be the first high profile adaptation to actually adapt the whole book

Mr Sausage wrote: Tue Sep 24, 2024 7:08 pm Personally I want to see someone turn the book into a horror film full of brutal passion and phantasmagoria. It's my favourite Victorian novel, but almost no one seems to read it as this frighting, elemental, otherworldly fantasy. People tend to see it as a heartrending romance mixed with social issues. But Heathcliffe is more gothic villain than romantic hero, and Cathy this wild tempestuous figure.

If anyone is going to lean into that reading, it's Fennell, so you may get a form of that wish

domino harvey wrote: Tue Sep 24, 2024 7:10 pm If she wants to differentiate this version, be the first high profile adaptation to actually adapt the whole book

Yes, I was going to say - Wuthering Heights hasn't so much been adapted, as excerpted in previous films.

This'd work better as a Netflix miniseries. It's not a large novel, but it does cover a considerable amount of years. I don't think you could do the whole thing in a two hour movie without rushing the important stuff, but a 6-to-8 part series would be perfect. Plot wise, The Talented Mr. Ripley works in a regular-length film, but the 8 episodes of Ripely really let the filmmakers focus on mood, atmosphere, and the various locations without having to sacrifice story or character. Wuthering Heights would benefit even more, with its own intense atmosphere and emphasis on time and geography.

therewillbeblus wrote: Tue Sep 24, 2024 7:31 pmIf anyone is going to lean into that reading, it's Fennell, so you may get a form of that wish

Oh yeah? I haven't seen Saltburn yet, but I took Fennell to be a progressive social satirist more than anything. Does she lean hard into the crazed and gothic in her last film?

Yes I’d say so. I see her as a social satirist that simultaneously leans heavily into soberly revealing the real horrors of bad men, so that seemed to fit

I can’t see her not heavily leaning on camp, especially with Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi leading the cast. Both are fine and versatile actors but would not be on my casting wishlist for these roles. Andrea Arnold’s adaptation is not high gothic, but it does capture the increasingly curdled tone of the first part of the book and the pervasive and unrelenting muck of the Earnshaw home.

For all its flaws, the Wyler film is still the best-cast version. Merle Oberon and Olivier are still who I see when I imagine the characters.

I also really like the audiobook narrated by Wanda McCaddon, and I’m a tough audience for audiobooks. (Listening to disembodied voices is not my jam, so the voice and performance has to be really compelling.)

Matt wrote:Both are fine and versatile actors but would not be on my casting wishlist for these roles."

I'm curious, who would your picks be?

You got me there! I don’t really keep up with young actors, so I don’t really know. I guess it depends on how much of the novel would be adapted and if you’d want the same actors to play younger and older Cathy and Heathcliff (I wouldn’t). I think I would prefer unknowns in general, with a Heathcliff of British-Asian or British-Arab origin, the stranger looking the better. I wouldn’t mind Thomasin McKenzie as Cathy, though. I think she’s marvelous. Claire Foy might make a good older Cathy. I think Merle Oberon’s own British-Asian origins, unknown at the time, bring an interesting subtext to the Wyler adaptation, and I don’t know who today’s Merle Oberon might be.

Frankly I’d rather see a Bunraku puppet adaptation or a Richard Williams-style animated version.

This bombed its test screening

Some amusing details:

There’s hyper-sexualized imagery — far more explicit than any previous adaptation of this material. The film opens with a public hanging that quickly descends into grotesque absurdity, as the condemned man ejaculates mid-execution, sending the onlooking crowd into a kind of orgiastic frenzy. A nun even fondles the corpse’s visible erection.

Later, a woman is strapped into a horse’s reins for a BDSM-tinged encounter. There are several masturbation scenes shot in that now-signature Fennell style—intimate, clinical, and purposefully discomforting. The camera lingers on suggestive textures: egg yolks running through fingers, dough being kneaded with quiet aggression, a slug sliding slowly down glass.

can't wait for Letterboxd users to post the "y'all just don't get it" reviews and get thousands of likes

domino harvey wrote: Wed Aug 06, 2025 1:48 pmdough being kneaded with quiet aggression

Sure, sure ... we all enjoy the sensuousness of kneading dough with quiet aggression until the bread turns out all lumpy and chewy.

Brian C wrote: Wed Aug 06, 2025 3:18 pm Sure, sure ... we all enjoy the sensuousness of kneading dough with quiet aggression until the bread turns out all lumpy and chewy.

and there are Youtube & TikTok Channels for that.

It sounds like the most unusual “Wuthering Heights” to date, and that might not be a bad thing. The last thing anyone wants is another by-the-numbers adaptation. What the next film version called for was a jolt of fresh energy, something bold and unexpected.

It exists already! Andrea Arnold did it in 2011!

Matt wrote: Wed Aug 06, 2025 5:41 pm

It sounds like the most unusual “Wuthering Heights” to date, and that might not be a bad thing. The last thing anyone wants is another by-the-numbers adaptation. What the next film version called for was a jolt of fresh energy, something bold and unexpected.

It exists already! Andrea Arnold did it in 2011!

Exactly. I wish that one had gotten a better rollout

I wish it was a better adaptation (and movie).

Having so far hated everything Fennell has been involved with as a director and/or writer I never held out much hope for this. Margot Robbie is way too old for a character who, in the novel at least, dies in her teens and I'm getting tired of her "wild child" performances, especially after Babylon. But I strongly suspect that is what got the project off the ground. And as jizz in Saltburn set social media alight, we get more of it here.

And while I love most of Andrea Arnold's work, her adaptation was the only time I remember where the handheld camera gave me motion sickness. Its starkly naturalistic approach makes for honourable attempt at an adaptation, but I found it a film that's hard to like. She wasn't very happy with it either.

The Curious Sofa wrote: Thu Aug 07, 2025 4:57 amMargot Robbie is way too old for a character who, in the novel at least, dies in her teens

What is with this? She also started playing Tonya Harding in I, Tonya starting at age, what, fifteen?

Teaser.

This movie looks like it was art-directed by Instagram filter.

Trailer. "Inspired by the greatest love story of all time." I think I'm gonna barf.

I will say, hippie wig aside, Elordi does make a fairly credible Heathcliff. As much as Olivier at least. And I like the shot of him riding the horse that looks like it was taken from Duel in the Sun.

Never in my life would I imagine Catherine as a 35-year-old blonde woman, though. I think she's meant to be 17-18 when she dies.