Ahead of the release of Wuthering Heights this week, critics’ reviews of the film have finally been released, and they’ve been decidedly mixed.
The Emerald Fennell-directed film, adapted from Emily Brontë’s beloved 1847 novel, follows a passionate and tumultuous love story set against the backdrop of the Yorkshire moors, exploring the intense and destructive relationship between Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi) and Catherine Earnshaw (Margot Robbie).
As of Monday evening, Wuthering Heights had a score of 71 percent from 65 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, and clocked in at 60 percent on Metacritic from 31 reviews.
The cast also includes Hong Chau, Alison Oliver, Shazad Latif, Martin Clunes, Owen Cooper, Charlotte Mellington, Ewan Mitchell and Amy Morgan.
Read on for key excerpts from some of the most prominent reviews from critics in Hollywood, ahead of the film’s release in theaters on Feb. 13.
The Hollywood Reporter‘s chief film critic, David Rooney, wrote in his review, “Fennell’s overhaul flirts with insanity, and if you can let go of preconceived notions about how this story should be told, it’s arguably the writer-director’s most purely entertaining film — pulpy, provocative, drenched in blazing color and opulent design, laced with anachronistic flourishes, sexy, pervy, irreverent and resonantly tragic. Often teetering on the verge between silly and clever, it’s Wuthering Heights for the Bridgerton generation, guaranteed to moisten tear ducts and inflame young hearts.”
The Independent‘s Clarisse Loughrey wrote in part, “With its title stylised in quotation marks, and a director’s statement that it’s intended to capture her experience of reading the book aged 14, it uses the guise of interpretation to gut one of the most impassioned, emotionally violent novels ever written, and then toss its flayed skin over whatever romance tropes seem most marketable. Adaptation or not, it’s an astonishingly hollow work.”
Alison Willmore, with Vulture, wrote in her review, “Wuthering Heights is an incredibly moist movie, and that’s without even taking into account how often the characters get caught in or choose to stride out into the rain (all the better to make their outfits cling). A snail leaves a languid slime trail across a window pane, a housemaid squishes shiny dough provocatively between her fingers while making bread at the kitchen table, a scarred back is shown beaded with sweat in a loving close-up — Emerald Fennell’s take on the 1847 Emily Brontë novel practically glistens with fluids.”
The Guardian‘s critic, Peter Bradshaw, wrote, “Emerald Fennell cranks up the campery as she reinvents Emily Brontë’s tale of Cathy and Heathcliff on the windswept Yorkshire moor as a 20-page fashion shoot of relentless silliness, with bodices ripped to shreds and a saucy slap of BDSM. Margot Robbie’s Cathy at one stage secretly heads off to the moor for a hilarious bit of self-pleasuring – although, sadly, there are no audaciously intercut scenes of thirst-trap Heathcliff, played by Jacob Elordi, simultaneously doing the same thing in the stable, while muttering gruffly in that Yerrrrrkshire accent of his.”
David Sims, with The Atlantic, penned in his review, “Wuthering Heights, the writer-director Emerald Fennell’s new adaptation of Emily Brontë’s groundbreaking Gothic novel, is her best film to date—a heaving, rip-snortingly carnal good time at the cinema. It is also a gooey, grimy mess. The camera lingers on dripping egg yolks and squishy, bubbling dough; the protagonist, Cathy Earnshaw (played by Margot Robbie), must wade through pig’s blood on her way to the moors near her home, leaving a trim of viscera on her gorgeously anachronistic dress. This is Fennell’s aesthetic throughout: loudly stylish on top, and just as loudly nasty right below the surface.”
Kevin Maher, chief film critic for The U.K. Times, wrote, “Who knew Isabella Linton was the best character in Wuthering Heights? She is in this vapid Brontë adaptation, anyway, a film that is enlivened briefly whenever she appears on screen, wickedly played by Alison Oliver. Otherwise, with a chemistry-free central romance between the bizarrely uninteresting Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi) and Cathy (Margot Robbie, also the film’s producer), this film self-deflates. There are conspicuous longueurs and characterizations that barely reflect the complexity of an Instagram reel let alone the greatest gothic novel in English literature. It is the first unfortunate stumble in the film-making ascent of the Oscar-winning writer-director Emerald Fennell (Saltburn and Promising Young Woman).”
Lindsey Bahr wrote for the Associated Press, “In these sex-deprived times at the cinema, if some corset kink, power games and smoldering star power from two genetically blessed Australians is what you’re looking for, Wuthering Heights might just satisfy that big-screen itch. There are myriad pleasures to be had in the bold, absurd pageantry and devilish scheming. Alison Oliver’s comic timing as the naive, skittish Isabella Linton is a particular delight. With the right crowd, it could make for a fun night out at the movies. Yet for all the big swings, Fennell’s Wuthering Heights amounts to something oddly shallow and blunt: garish and stylized fan fiction with the scope and budget of an old-school Hollywood epic.”
Caryn James, with the BBC, wrote, “Cathy and Heathcliff are still recognisably Bronte’s lovers, irresistibly drawn to each other from childhood yet fated to be apart. But Fennell’s approach is an extravagant swirl: sexy, dramatic, melodramatic, occasionally comic and often swoonily romantic. There is a lot of standing in the rain and wind, kissing in the rain and wind, and just rain and wind on the Yorkshire moors. She laces the 19th-Century setting with contemporary touches, from its costumes fit for an Oscar red carpet to its sexual frankness. A flesh-coloured wall is based on a scan of Robbie’s skin, veins and all. But under it all Fennell channels something essential in the book – the corrosive behaviour that can result from thwarted desire. Jealousy, anger and vengeance are as natural to Cathy and Heathcliff as their endless passion for each other. If you embrace the film’s audacious style and think of it as a reinvention not an adaptation, this bold, artful Wuthering Heights is utterly absorbing.”
USA Today‘s Brian Truitt wrote in his review, “Fennell’s adaptation takes some liberties with Emily Brontë’s original 1847 Victorian-era novel but unless you’re a devout superfan, you likely won’t be too mad. The Oscar-winning British filmmaker crafts a sumptuous bad romance that’s quite haughty, darkly hilarious and ultimately heartfelt.”
Beth Webb, for Empire, penned in her review, “There is notably more plot to Brontë’s novel than in Fennell’s reimagining, and while the film doesn’t need a denser narrative, it could benefit from feeling more grounded — especially when Cathy and Heathcliff fight and fornicate like teenagers, ricocheting between lust and loathing. ‘I hated you, I loved you, too’ is all well and good, but here the stakes become more subdued as style takes over. The film is undeniably expertly crafted, and Fennell — who has quickly risen to become one of Britain’s buzziest Hollywood exports — has certainly stepped up as a filmmaker in terms of scope. But had Wuthering Heights stayed closer to earth, the weight of this tragic romance would hit harder.”
New York Post‘s Johnny Oleksinski wrote in part, “Traditionalists will moan that Fennell has turned Brontë’s book into a sweeping romance. And, yes, she has. Music swells, tears flow, faces are perfect. But what makes the movie so enthralling is that she hits on a powerful tug-of-war: We root hard for Heathcliff and Cathy, even though we know full well we shouldn’t.”
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