Wuthering Heights (1992)
Director: Peter Kosminsky. Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Binoche, Janet McTeer, Simon Shepherd, Jeremy
Northam, Jason Riddington, Sophie Ward, Sinéad O'Connor. Screenplay: Anne Devlin (from the novel by Emily
Brontë).
Too bad that this teleplay of the classic novel were not made five years later, when the two stars had
done enough work in a number of rich, challenging films; the primary problem with this adaptation is an
emotional distance, even a certain shallowness—qualities which no interpretation of Brontë's tempestuous,
muscular, even violently passionate characters can afford to confer.
As it is, Kosminsky's Wuthering Heights scores points for ambition but little else. Unlike the
famous 1939 version with Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier, Kosminsky's movie takes on the whole novel.
The new film not only bothers to portray the second generation of Earnshaws and Lintons but, through
devices like the double-casting of Binoche as her own daughter, it explores the eerie parallels of
character that cross from one era of the narrative to the next. The film also has some striking locations,
and it isn't interested in playing up the "period" through gowns and sets beyond what seems fit for a
rough-hewn farming enclave in a severe region of The Isles.
That said, Wuthering Heights constantly suffers under the charmless, formless work of Fiennes and
Binoche, two actors who have become unfailingly charismatic as their careers have continued but who are
either intimidated by the cultural stature of this story or confounded at this early stage in their
careers by the psychological complexities of these characters. Whatever the case, they make these folks
none too interesting and fail entirely to project the kind of organic connection that keep Cathy and
Heathcliff's union intact despite literal walls of property and geography, not to mention more
intangible boundaries like life and death. The renowned actress Janet McTeer unfortunately sinks
irretrievably into the background, marginalizing (as all previous versions have) the complicated,
potentially subversive character of Nelly, Catherine's servant.
A Wuthering Heights with no passion is like a Les Misérables with no Revolution: the single
ingredient that provides plot and theme for the entire work, without which nothing really
functions. The stars' later notoriety, as well as a bizarre framing device with Sinéad O'Connor as Emily
Brontë, should keep the film alive as a curio for Brontë scholars or freak-casting enthusiasts. For
anyone else, though, this film, like the ornery Heathcliff, is probably best left alone. Grade: C–