Wuthering Heights (1998)

Best movie of this year hands down!

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Wuthering Heights is one of the literary masterpieces with complex characters(especially Heathcliff, a character that makes Mr Rochester, another tormented character, seem tame in comparison) and a truly dark, moving story that is full to the brim with atmosphere. Like the work of Charles Dickens and George Eliot as examples Wuthering Heights is one of the most difficult books to adapt and is almost unfilmable as well. Every adaptation of Wuthering Heights is worth the look though some work better than others. This was a fine version of Wuthering Heights, along with the Laurence Olivier film it is the best adaptation. True it could have done with a longer length especially for a book as lengthy and complex as Wuthering Heights, and the sections with the youngsters seemed on the rushed side(they also age a bit too quickly). It is however one of- perhaps THE- most faithful adaptation, there are omissions of course as you'd expect from a film compressed into a shorter running time but in detail and spirit with all the major details and characters intact it is to the extent that if she were alive Emily Bronte herself would recognise it. The adaptation is even better on its own, the locations are breath-taking and remarkably vivid in a way where you can literally smell and feel the atmosphere being conveyed. The photography is not too flashy or studio-bound, it has a sense of freedom but allows the story to resonate. While the costumes are richly evocative, if you had a time machine and had travelled to this period it is very likely to be as rendered here. The music score is hauntingly beautiful and melancholic, particularly at the end and the ending here is poignant beyond words (none of the other adaptations of the book have done it as emotionally as here). The writing is very thoughtfully adapted with a great deal of intimacy and very true to Bronte's prose, and the story is still the dark, brooding and passionate tale of the book with as said already the major scenes all here and with the impact they should. The direction is strong throughout as is the acting. Not all the actors are age-appropriate but for me the performances themselves are what matter more and the adaptation delivers on that front. Robert Cavannah is a Heathcliff that is brutish and brooding yet tormented and pained, rightfully allowing us to be terrified of Heathcliff and later go on to pity him too. Orla Brady is a spirited and feisty Cathy, also very affecting, her delirium scene is beautifully played and genuinely disturbing. Matthew McFadyen's Hareton is very charming, while Crispin Bonham-Carter's Edgar is very well-read and humane in a role that can easily be weak and the Hindley of Ian Shaw is appropriately tragic, a tormenter at first but later he is almost(if not quite to that extent) as pained as Heathcliff. Polly Hemmingway and Tom Georgeson are equally engaging. Overall, one of the better Wuthering Heights adaptations and recommended. 9/10 Bethany Cox

There is a lot wrong with this version of the classic tale. First and foremost the compressing of the story into two hours, the original and best version with Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon only told a fraction of the book and it was of equal length, makes everything feel rushed and motivations fuzzy. Almost as damaging is the miscasting of Robert Cavanah in the lead. Heathcliff is a complex, difficult, mostly unlikable character which requires an actor of great personal magnetism to bridge that gap for the audience, Cavanah is not that guy. He just seems cruel, insane and totally unsympathetic. Orla Brady is a bland Cathy making Heathcliffs mad devotion all the more puzzling. Another sore spot, no one ages! Once the main characters reach maturity their looks never change even though decades pass. The one bright spot is Matthew MacFayden whose performance is controlled and centered unfortunately his part is small and comes late in the proceedings so he can do little to rescue this woeful effort. Watch the 1939 version instead.

As a big fan of wuthering heights, i was ready to give this film a chance. But i have to say, i hated it. Robert cavanah is not right for heathcliff. More importantly, this film does not follow the book. it kills the book in fact, and changes the plot. Cathy and hieroglyphs loveis more sexual in the film than in the book, and shows lust rather thanlove. i was very upset with this adaptation. as a stand alone film it would have been good, but as a novel adaptation - a very poor interpretation. The 1992 wuthering heights with Ralph fiennes however is an amazing film. it is very true to the book, very emotive. i cried 3 times throughout the film. Ralph fiennes plays heathcliff exactly as i imagined him. Juliette binoche pulls Cathy and Cathy's daughter off very well. Horton is portrayed perfectly too. i recommend anyone to watch the 1992 film, and not this television version.

I don't know if this really contains spoilers, but I marked it just in case.I expected a lot from this movie. I knew it was made-for-TV and had low production values but that didn't bother me. I thought it was too fast-paced and it had some terrible casting. Why were Heathcliff and Cathy, who looked to be at least in their thirties, running around the moors like little kids? They're not supposed to be grown up when they do that! They meet the Lintons when they're 12 years old! I've yet to see a version which actually portrays them as kids for that scene, but this one was the worst because they look so darn old! Cathy is supposed to be, what, 20 or so when she dies? Orla Brady was 37! Heathcliff was even older, which was fine for the later scenes but couldn't they have even tried to age him down with makeup?? Also, Nelly was supposed to be Hindley's age, yet she was in her fifties for the whole movie!!! I'm not a purist by any means but things like this make it hard to take a film seriously. It was alright, but again, way too fast-moving. An average movie.