WHAT I LIKED: In the last few years, Emerald Fennel had made two brilliantly bold, singular and contentious films; one ('Promising Young Woman') about tackling misogyny, and the other ('Saltburn') about class mobility.
Her latest work is an adaptation of Emily Brontë's 'Wuthering Heights,' and it too has been the subject of much debate and analysis since its release. But there's an important distinction this time around, as the discussions haven't centred around any thematic depths explored in the film because there simply aren't any. Instead, people have been arguing whether it's right to adapt a classic text in such a shallow and vacuous way.
There is impressively little depth to be found in this script, as Fennell has stripped away any race or class commentary from the source material to focus on the toxic love story at its centre. Rich girl Cathy (Margot Robbie) grows up and falls in love with her stable boy Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi) but then marries a Lord (Shazad Latif), and so begins a toxic love affair where the pair reconnect and then try to spite each other for moving on.
That's a perfectly valid romance story in itself, but it has to be said that Fennel is mostly interested in style this time around, so what does engage is the impressive costumes, set design and cinematography. Cathy's home is a black, grimy, Gothic nightmare that looks like it's been ripped straight from a Tim Burton film, the Yorkshire moors are drenched in mist and rain, and the Lord's house that Cathy then imprisons herself in is insipid and overbearing in every way with its sickening opulence realised in deep reds and whites. And all the while Charli XCX's score pulsates in the background, providing a hint to the darkness that was left behind in the source material.
WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE: It really would have been a lot more engaging if Fennell had spent time developing the characters and their relationship. Without feeling the nuance of Cathy's obligation to marry into wealth for example, she just seems hateful for choosing that over love, and, similarly, without real development of Heathcliff's class (let alone race) struggle, he's just painted as an animalistic brute.
Without any substance, it all feels more like a music video where romance tropes are represented rather than developed like they would be in a real film. Also, though it's been marketed as sexy and daring, in reality the romance cooks to little more than a simmer, and the most provocative moments aren't even between the central pair themselves.
VERDICT: Adaptations don't have to be faithful, but even on its own terms, Emerald Fennel's 'Wuthering Heights,' is a classic case of style over substance.
