Wuthering Heights Must Overcome Emerald Fennell and the Novel’s Biggest Weakness

It was announced Monday that director Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman and Saltburn) will next direct an adaptation of Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel, Wuthering Heights. The film is set to start shooting in 2025 with Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi playing the novel’s iconic lead characters, Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff. No further details regarding the film’s cast, release date, or plot have been confirmed at this time. 

When it comes to Wuthering Heights, though, the devil is always in the details. While it is generally considered to be a classic of Western literature, the Gothic novel has long divided critics and readers. Its tale of two lovers caught between the expectations of society and their feuding families may sound like a classic Romeo and Juliet-style narrative, but Wuthering Heights is so much darker and complex than even that often romanticized and misremembered Shakespeare play. 

It’s a novel full of violence perpetuated by often fundamentally unlikable characters. Granted, some of those criticisms are rooted in outdated moral panics (“How dare they question the righteousness of Victorian society?!?!?”), but the book’s complex themes and the often intentionally overly dramatic ways it explores them have long challenged readers who find themselves responding to the text, regardless of the respect they may have for the ideas of the material. That’s why some prefer getting their Wuthering Heights fix by watching one of the many Wuthering Heights film or TV adaptations that often make sharp choices in truncating the story. 

But even then, most of those adaptations have struggled to clear the book’s most infamous hurdle: its multi-generational structure. Wuthering Heights not only addresses some tricky topics through the lens of despicable characters, but does so via a sweeping narrative that spans decades. Even fans of the novel are divided on its second half (or “second volume” in the original publishing), which features a rather sizable time jump, many new characters, and questionable deviations from the first half of the book. It has even been suggested that the second half feels like it was written by a different person (though that is more of a literary criticism than a conspiracy). 

Interpretations aside, the very nature of that second half has long posed a problem for Wuthering Heights’ numerous adaptations. Some of those versions (like the famous 1939 William Wyler film) cut significant chunks out of the later parts of the novel to streamline the continuation of the initial Catherine and Heathcliff story. While that adaptation was widely praised on its own merits (it was nominated for eight Academy Awards, and is still celebrated for Laurence Olivier’s interpretation of Heathcliffe), it has long been criticized by readers for altering so much of the novel and arguably compromising some of the book’s more complex themes in the process. Other adaptations (like the 1992 Wuthering Heights film) that have attempted to adapt the full story have been praised for their faithfulness, but criticized for failing to properly translate that material to another medium in an effective way.

While the “full” version of Wuthering Heights has been called one of those unfilmmable projects, it’s probably more accurate to describe such an adaptation as “complicated.” That’s also what makes Emerald Fennell’s decision to tackle that text so fascinating. 

Based on her previous works, there is little doubt that Fennell is capable of at least attempting to adapt a story filled with revenge, fundamentally unlikable characters, dark themes, and stately manors. Those are all quickly becoming some of the director’s trademarks, which seemingly makes the intimidating Wuthering Heights a strangely perfect fit for her. 

What worries me most is the infamous nature of Wuthering Heights’ final half. I’m a bigger Fennell defender than most, but both Promising Young Woman and Saltuburn suffered from notable final act problems. The former compromised its most intriguing ideas with a shoehorned easy ending, and Saltburn burned down whatever illusions of complexity it could have maintained with a truly awful conventional “twist” spelled out to the audience in agonizing detail. 

Granted, we do not know if Fennell will attempt to adapt Wuthering Heights’ second half as written or if she will reinterpret that portion of the novel as other adaptations have done. However, the smart money is on Fennell taking on the whole thing. It s just hard to imagine that she will back down from that challenge given the nature of her previous works and her general willingness to take some big swings. 

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While it’s easy enough to imagine Fennell trying and failing to make the full novel truly work onscreen, the prospect of her attempting to do so is undeniably intriguing. As the great Roy McAvoy in Tin Cup taught us, there is something exciting about going for the big swing rather than taking the drop and playing around the hazard. 

While those who have altered Wuthering Heights’ in the past have often done so with the best possible intentions (despite what literary purists with little understanding of the nature of an adaptation may argue), the idea of someone delivering a more complete version of that story on-screen has long been enticing.

Fennell is that rare modern director who has garnered the good will required to tackle such a project, theoretically has the capabilities to do it justice, and is willing to endure a notable misfire along the way. In an era of overly cautious major filmmaking, it’s surprisingly easy to root for an exciting young director betting big on a potentially perilous passion project.