Wuthering Heights (2012)

It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

A gritty, earthy version filmed on the North Yorkshire moors, which are a star in their own right, the wet and the wind make you feel like you're there. The use of mostly non professional local actors, worked for me, adding to that realistic feel, other assets were the use of a hand held camera and the use of natural light indoors. Kaya Scodelario makes a fiery, troublesome Kathy and maybe the pick of the cast. James Howson is fine as the brooding, mono syllabic Heathcliff. Andrea Arnold has directed an excellent different take on a classic novel.

Arnold's cinematic approach to Brontë's novel "Wuthering Heights" results in an adaptation that is original not only because it rearranges the narrative and provides a fresh new take on the characters but also because it powerfully delivers the story's experiential content, and makes it a central tenet of the spectator's engagement with the story. In other words, the description of the physical and material world of the story, which was observational in most of Brontë's novel, becomes the very engine of Arnold's film through the voice of the two narrators and through the characters' observational description. In an essay I published in The Victorian journal, I expand this idea of adapting with the senses ("Adapting with the Senses: Wuthering Heights as a Perceptual Experience.")

I really liked this version. I love the book, and I like many of the interpretations people have made throughout the years, but this Heathcliff made the most sense to me. He wasn't just a brooding, selfish man, he had a real reason for his anger and hatred for his treating Kathy so coldly. Yes, he had his reason of course in the earlier ones, but it never felt fully plausible. This I could see. Having witnessed racism, judgment for no reason other than the color of one's skin, it made more sense that the people who treated him so horribly did. The other versions just didn't seem real, Heathcliff was just an angry, handsome white man (yes he was a Romany, but non of the actors who played him, that I saw, were) who people happened to be mean to. Here, though it isn't right, it was more true to form people treating him in such a way. I could believe it, and I could sympathize more with him.

Displaying hanging of puppy dogs and suggesting resulted death by a child - parental guidance mandatory. How is this no animals where harmed during their participation?? ><Good camera work, Gritty mood throughout the whole movie. Because generations know the story this is a refreshing but very slow take on the classic.Some costumes look out of time and human nature is portrayed in its most sliming, noisy & disgusting way possible.Cast & crew can take a certain pride in their attempt but I would never recommend this movie for entertainment.