It Makes Total Sense

Other Wuthering Heights 2026 articles:

The Guardian is worried about the Wuthering Heights 2026 bizarre merchandise:

Emerald Fennell’s lust-fuelled take on Emily Brontë’s novel has cued a hot flush of merchandise ranging from themed snacks to thongs. What exactly are they buying into? (...)

That appetite for Emerald Fennell’s bodice-ripping adaptation of Emily Brontë’s yarn of doomed romance is high is not in doubt. Whether it’s high enough to sustain sales for an official Wuthering Heights açai bowl seems less certain.

Yet this is exactly what is on offer in food aisles across the US, with two bespoke bowls churned up for hungry film fans with the explanatory slogan: “This is what happens when you turn yearning into flavour.” (...)

The overtly erotic nature of many of these collaborations feels calculated to spin the story into a dark romance ripe for the BookTok audience. Posts from the official Wuthering Heights TikTok account use buzzwords like “yearning” and mention romance tropes popular on the platform such as jealous lovers. The overt sexuality of the trailer, the “Come Undone” body oil and candle made for dripping on to partners, the silk eye mask and lingerie edit with Lounge all lean into a vaguely BDSM aesthetic. It’s a particular take on the story and a way for fans to once again feel as if they are participating in something transgressive but in the most capitalist, and therefore normative, way possible. (Natalie Wall)

The Conversation thinks that Emerald Fennell was very well placed to adapt Wuthering Heights: 

While previous adaptations of the novel often emphasise the wildness of the landscapes, Fennell’s film has a heightened theatricality. The costumes, impressive set design and lighting all suggest an expressionistic take on the story which privileges the uncontrollable emotions of the characters, rather than the naturalistic approach of other filmmakers.

This theatrical visual style also allows Fennell to follow the trend for recent period dramas to present a colourful and rather fantastical vision of the past (hello Bridgerton). Albeit with her own darker twist.

Following on from Saltburn, which was set in the titular stately home, Fennell’s Wuthering Heights is also rooted in the British class system, once again following the fate of a seemingly underprivileged hero (Heathcliff) and his complex relationship with his social superior (the ambitious Cathy). (...)

So, will Fennell’s Wuthering Heights find its audience? All the signs are there. The reception of her previous work has shown that there is an appetite for boundary-pushing, morally ambiguous characters, and her uncompromising ability to plumb the darkest corners of human nature makes her an ideal auteur to tackle this material. (Shelley Galpin)

ClassicFM explores the Wuthering Heights musical compositions. From Alfred Newman's 1939 score until Charli XCX's 2026 one. Passing through Bernard Herrmann's opera, Kate Bush's song, Cliff Richard's musical, Claude-Michel Schönberg's ballet... and forgetting, among many others, Michel Legrand's 1970 score, Ryuchi Sakamoto's 1992 score, and Carlisle Floyd's opera.

Despite all three of the Brontë sisters achieving success in the literary world, it was Emily who was the virtuoso. She spent most of her life at Hayworth House (sic) where she became skilled in many disciplines and found serious acclaim as a brilliant pianist. After her father recognised her talents he sent her to study at Hegner (sic) Pensionnat in Brussels where she would tutor fellow students.

She was known to play Beethoven sonatas with precision, and the Romantic themes of the German composer’s music inspired Brontë to explore similar ideas in her gothic romance. Emily sought to provoke reactions from the readers, aiming to transgress traditional fiction.

Upon release, critics described Wuthering Heights as ‘irredeemably monstrous’ echoing similar reactions to Beethoven’s Symphony No.2, which was described as ‘a gross enormity’. (Jacques Richardson)

Maybe calling Emily a virtuoso is quite a bit too much. But who knows what could happen at Hayworth House? 

Suzie Davis, the production designer of the film, explores the film's sets in Better Homes & Gardens:

Using Color to Stir Emotion

Much of Brontë's original text is unsettling, with the reader never quite knowing what our erratic characters will do next and what will be the consequences of their actions. To capture this feeling on screen, Davies and her team relied on rich red hues.

Set design of a room with reflective flooring decorated walls and artistic embellishments

"Red is always a powerful color on film—it carries instinctive associations with desire, vitality, and danger," Davies says. "That controlled use of red helped introduce an unease into the image—something visceral rather than literal—so the audience feels tension before they necessarily understand. We used it very sparingly yet with intention, never decoratively."

Blending Time Periods to Tell a Story

Forbidden love is a literary trope that transcends space and time—it's not bound to the confines of the Victorian era. "This film was never about documenting the 1800s in a literal or academic way," Davies says. "Instead, it was about capturing the essence of a teenage fever dream—the sensation of first encountering the book."

While the upcoming Wuthering Heights adaptation certainly pays homage to architectural trends from the late 18th century, the overall set builds on and pays tribute to several eras.

"The design deliberately draws from multiple periods," Davies says. "In reality, buildings from the 1800s always carry the residue of earlier centuries—those layers exist subconsciously within the architecture. Even a contemporary space contains traces of Georgian, Victorian, or Edwardian thinking. We embraced that idea and even pushed beyond it, allowing moments of something more brutal and even contemporary to emerge."

Architecture Helps Convey Characterizations

At the heart of the Wuthering Heights story is the tale of two homesteads—Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange—along with the characters who inhabit them.

"The architecture of Wuthering Heights was designed to physically deny Heathcliff ownership of the space," Davies reveals. "The ceilings are low—particularly in the kitchen—so that he is never able to stand fully upright ... The house never belongs to him; it resists him at every scale."

Just four miles away, notoriously free-spirited Catherine Linton isn't sitting comfortably either. But for a different reason.

"[Thrushcross Grange]'s architecture and design reflect Catherine’s attempt to reshape herself to fit in," Davies says. "It is ordered, decorative, and entirely man-made—the opposite of Wuthering Heights. While it appears more refined, it is also more artificial, and ultimately less aligned with who she truly is. Catherine belongs more to the raw, windswept landscape than to this constructed world, and the design reinforces that tension between aspiration and identity."

Emerald Fennell goes full queer and controversial on Attitude:

 “Isabella and Cathy – there’s a very strong feeling there,” Emerald told Attitude. “Also, what’s fascinating about the time is you did have really romantic, intense attachments to your friends then.

“In a way, even now, that line is always very, very blurred. And it has to be.”

The Promising Young Woman director went on to say: “The thing about Nellie and Cathy is, they’re like sisters, but they’re not. It’s the same as Heathcliff and Cathy. There is jealousy there. There is possessiveness.”

“Similarly, Isabella is making Cathy a ‘book of friendship,’ which I think we have to admit, is extremely pornographic in nature! [Queerness] is part of the world of desire. It makes total sense.”

Also on Attitude, how Margot Robbie listened to Kate Bush on the film's set. The Yorkshire Post summarizes what the cast and the director have been saying about the film.

AnOther Magazine has five things to know about Emily Brontë:

This Gothic romance has haunted multiple generations of readers around the world, with Cathy and Heathcliff immortalised in the cultural imagination as avatars for dramatic, windswept love. From Sylvia Plath to Muriel Spark, Daphne du Maurier and Patricia Lockwood, Brontë’s brutal love story continues to fascinate writers. Cathy’s lament, “Let me in your window”, is the ghostly refrain from Kate Bush’s famous song, while Simone Rocha has cited Emily Brontë as an influence for her romantic designs. Emerald Fennell’s new film is just the latest in numerous screen adaptations, including the Bollywood remake, Dil Diya Dard Liya (1966), and a 1988 Japanese adaptation that reimagines the story with samurai in feudal Japan. The influence of Wuthering Heights is profound; it has permeated and altered popular culture, in the words of Cathy herself, “like wine through water”.  (Emily Dinsdale)

Hitc quotes the tennis player Coco Gauff, who also has something to say about the film:

She admitted: “I’m really curious how they’re going to do the movie, because I saw that they’re marketing it as the greatest love story, and after reading it, it’s not a great love story. So I don’t really know if this is about to be like, I feel like it’s just going to be the director’s take on the movie, based off the marketing. We’ll see. It was a good book, but it definitely is not the greatest love story. It’s a lot of toxicity and abuse going on in that book.” (Callum Davis)

WWD goes for Margot Robbie's press tour shoes and The Handbook praises Jacob Elordi's outfits, New Beauty, and Cosmopolitan are all about the looks of the tour. IndieWire questions if the whole press tour is "Messy Performance Art or Marketing Rage Bait". The choker is back, claims The Times and Margot Robbie knows it.

Daily Mail goes to Wuthering Heights 2009's filming, which sparked Tom Hardy and Charlotte Riley's love story. Woman and Home has a Wuthering Heights Quiz. Metro announces that the BBC is streaming the "sublime" Emily 2022 ahead of the Wuthering Heights 2026 premiere. Halifax Courier reports how "moorland supporters are set to gather on Valentine’s Day to celebrate Emerald Fennell’s upcoming adaptation of the Emily Brontë novel Wuthering Heights."  Yorkshire Life discusses Wuthering Heights Yorkshire Dales staycations.