Venice and First Look to Heathcliff

It's been finally confirmed that Andrea Arnold's Wuthering Heights is on the official selection for competition of the 68th Venice Film Festival (31st August to 10th September 2011):

ANDREA ARNOLD - WUTHERING HEIGHTS
UK, 128'
Kaya Scodelario, Nichola Burley, Steve Evets, Oliver Milburn 

Not only that. The film's UK distributor Artificial Eye has released the first picture of James Howson as Heathcliff as you can see above. Artificial Eye's Press release:

Artificial Eye is delighted to announce Andrea Arnold’s Wuthering Heights will have its World Premiere at this year’s 68th Venice International Film Festival. Wuthering Heights is Academy Award®-winning writer-director Andrea Arnold‘s third feature following the BAFTA® award winning, Fish Tank and Cannes Jury Prize winning Red Road. Wuthering Heights is produced by Robert Bernstein and Douglas Rae of Ecosse Films and Kevin Loader of Free Range Films with Executive Producer Tessa Ross for Film4. Wuthering Heights was developed and co-funded by the Lottery through the UK Film Council’s film funds. Film4, Goldcrest and Screen Yorkshire are co-financiers and international sales are handled by HanWay Films.
A Yorkshire hill farmer on a visit to Liverpool finds a homeless boy on the streets. He takes him home to live as part of his family on the isolated Yorkshire moors where the boy forges an obsessive relationship with the farmer’s daughter.
Based on the novel by Emily Brontë and adapted for the screen by Andrea Arnold and Olivia Hetreed, Wuthering Heights stars newcomer James Howson as “Heathcliff” and Kaya Scodelario (Skins) as “Cathy” alongside Steve Evets (“Joseph”), Oliver Milburn (“Mr Linton”), and Nicola Burley (“Isabella Linton”). Arnold is joined by long-time creative collaborators, Director of Photography, Robbie Ryan BSC and Editor, Nicolas Chaudeurge.

IndieWire's Shadow and Act says:

It features the first non-white actor to play the lead male role (aka Heathcliff) in the dozen or so times the literary work has been adapted for both the big and small screens. (...)
The ethnicity of the character Heathcliff, who’s really the heart of the novel, has been the subject of some debate amongst academics; author of the original work, Brontë, describes Heathcliff as a “dark-skinned gypsy in aspect and a little lascar” - lascar being a 17th century term used to describe sailors from India or Southeast Asia. Throughout the book, the darkness of his skin is emphasized, though once he’s described as not being a “regular black.” Another character suggests him to be of some Chinese ancestry.
Brontë, unfortunately doesn’t give enough for us to be certain of Heathcliff’s ethnic origins, however, if anything, I think we could all probably agree that one thing he isn’t is Caucasian - not strictly so anyway. He’s likely of mixed heritage - although just about every previous actor who’s played the character on film has pretty much been white - Laurence Olivier, Timothy Dalton, and Ralph Fiennes, notably. So, the casting of Howson may actually be closer to what Brontë had in mind when she penned her opus.
Regardless, he’s playing the part.
The Andrea Arnold film, which was initially announced earlier last year (although it had been in the works since 2008, passing from one set of actors/directors to another, before landing in Arnold’s hands), was shot in secrecy. In fact, the casting of Howson was kept concealed throughout the production… until the announcement last fall when the film was going into post-production. No one outside of the film’s crew, and likely the Venice Film Festival’s curators, has seen anything of the film - not a still image, no footage, nothing.  (tambay)

Check also Rope of Silicon.

Thanks to the anonymous comment who pointed us in the direction of Channel Four's Twitter/ Facebook.

Photo credit: Agatha A. Nitecka

EDIT: Reactions: HeyUGuys!,  Montreal Gazette, The Guardian, DIY...

Categories: Movies-DVD-TV, Wuthering_Heights