Fans of classic novelist Emily Bronte be forewarned, this 2011 version of Wuthering Heights is definitely not your typical adaptation and you may be left feeling outraged. For one thing, this is the first time I believe that the pivotal role of orphan Heathcliff is played by a black actor! In fact there are no familiar faces in the cast. Then there is the film’s format which was 4:3 leaving black bars on the left and right of the TV screen!!! I have not seen a film in this format for years!! Finally there is the rather unconventional way in which the story was told. Brutal, vulgar, with hardly any dialouge, heavy accent when there was (thank goodness for the subtitles), no music soundtrack, and basically having not a single character worth sympathy or rooting for! Heathcliff for example is portrayed as a bloody good for nothing lazy bastard who is selfish and arrogant. I had not read the book and vaguely remember watching a BBC TV series many years back, so basically do not have any reference to make of this. Was Emily Bronte’s novel really this brutal and with such unlikeable characters? This almost plays like a case against people to fall in love!
So based on the above I would not fault you for concluding that you should stay clear away from this if you wish to retain your good impression of how good British costume dramas should be (think the recent beautiful adaptation of Jane Eyre). This may be true but I however have to confess that I did find this a fascinating watch despite my reservations of how this was presented at multiple levels. At the end of the day, director Andrea Arnold (previous credit includes the award winning Fish Tank) needs to be commended for taking all sorts of risks with this project and never yielding to the conventional in her approach, making this an interesting if uneven experience.
Ratings: 2 stars
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April 1, 2012 at 5:58 am
BronteFan
the book is really brutal in my opinion… when i read the novel the first thing i thought was that the story was really bitter…Heathcliff became a person full of revenge and bitterness that hardly can love anyone, and besides everyone dies at the end, except cathy and hareton (they married, but what other choice they have?) For me, it`s a story of deception, bitter romance, broken hearts and revenge feelings; perfectly written by Emily Bronte.
April 1, 2012 at 8:08 am
Kah Min
Thanks BronteFan for your thoughts on this. Sounds like the novel covered more grounds than this movie adaptation did! I thought what was portrayed in this film was predominently the bitterness. Besides, the way Heathcliff was portrayed here, he seems pretty much full of himself right from the beginning! Not much to love about that character to begin with! LOL …