It's a film that has sharply divided opinions, with some, like David Sims in The Atlantic, praising it as a "rip-snortingly carnal good time", while others – like Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian – have decried it as an "emotionally hollow, bodice-ripping misfire."
We're talking, of course, about Emerald Fennell's take on "Wuthering Heights" (yes, the quotation marks are intentional on the director's part), which makes its streaming debut this week on HBO Max.
It's rare that a big, mainstream film like this so sharply divides critical opinion straight down the middle. It currently sits at 58% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (which measures professional critical opinion) and at a rather more respectable 76% on the site's audience opinion tracker, which suggests that quite a lot of viewers found much to enjoy in the movie.
"Wuthering Heights" is inspired by the all time classic 1847 novel by Emily Brontë. The story follows the troubled romance between young Cathy Earnshaw (Margot Robbie) and a handsome but brooding outcast named Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi). The two meet as youngsters and form an undeniable attraction. By the time they have grown up, however, Cathy is planning to marry a wealthy textile merchant named Edgar Linton (Shazad Latif), which leads Heathcliff to spiral into bitter jealousy. And so begins a tale of deep romantic longing and toxic obsession.
Like we said at the top, Emerald Fennell's new version of the story (which only really adapts the first half of the book, for spoilery reasons we won't get into here) has proven a touch divisive. Our own Molly Edwards offered a more positive view of the film, stating in an op-ed that "Fennell has done exactly what she set out to do: bring her own version of the novel to the screen."
Now that it's coming to HBO Max, those that didn't see the film in the cinema can decide what they make of it for themselves.
"Wuthering Heights" is streaming on HBO Max from May 1.
