Is the sight of the human tongue really so shocking? Were 1996 audiences ducking in their seats à la L’Arrivée d’un train en gare de La Ciotat when Matthew Lillard kept jutting his out like a jackass in Scream? Judging from Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights, we’re meant to react like so to the sight of Jacob Elordi’s tongue in many of the film’s erotically charged scenes. That is perhaps a microcosm of this new adaptation’s failed transgression.
Of course, Emily Brontë’s text has been adapted countless times––be it by Luis Buñuel, Jacques Rivette, William Wyler, or, most recently, Andrea Arnold. (This iteration shares some of the latter’s “this ain’t your grandma’s Wuthering Heights” DNA.) The source’s elaborate structure, frequent cruelty, and supernatural overtones have been difficult for any one adaptation to perfectly capture, as all those qualities often seem incongruous. This is likely why so many films have been made from it: each adaptation is not so much a “we’ll get it right this time” effort as it is an invitation for directors to treat the book as an open canvas.
Enter Emerald Fennell, the “female edgelord” (to quote an interview published on this site) of contemporary middlebrow filmmakers. She sticks to the basic set-up: our romantic leads, Cathy and Heathcliff, meet as children on the 19th-century Yorkshire moors, the latter a servant to the former’s brutish father. Their connection is instant, but fate and class structure tear them apart. Having grown into adults portrayed by two remarkably beautiful movie stars (Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi), the moment has come for them to finally consummate their longing. However, the hard times fallen upon Cathy’s father mean she must marry for money, rather than love, to the wealthy Edgar Linton (Shazad Latif). The heartbroken Heathcliff rides off into the sunset, while Cathy is destined for a lavish lifestyle––and a lot of boring missionary sex––with her new husband.
Once Heathcliff re-enters the picture years later, now a lord to rival Edgar, Wuthering Heights‘ two strands––kinkiness and tragedy––become apparent. Fennell’s big change to the text seems her desire to make Cathy a new icon of “female gooning.” The film’s focus on skin, fluids, goo, and fingers in orifices signals her highly sexualized take. Yet it never quite erupts or––to evoke its own imagery––gushes. If anything, it feels tame. Fennell has said her intention was to create a new Titanic (a romantic classic that younger girls would see over and over) but the film feels stuck in that adolescent space while simultaneously trying to be “shocking.” Will anyone over 13 years old actually be rattled by any of this?
It doesn’t help that Wuthering Heights struggles significantly in its third act, giving an impression of too much footage left on the cutting-room floor. Between odd tonal swerves and the rushed conclusion to a character’s tragic arc, Fennell’s ending lands with a total thud. The film ultimately, oddly feels as square as William Wyler’s 1939 iteration, no matter how many allusions to masturbation.
Wuthering Heights opens in theaters on Friday, February 13.