Andrea Arnold, director of the latest adaptation of Wuthering Heights, said she didn’t feel at all constrained by the novel when directing her film. For this relief much thanks in the case of the absentee Lockwood and the convoluted narrative he shares with Nelly; less so perhaps in the omission of the final third of the Brontës story including the death of Heathcliff.
She did however want to be true to what she called ‘Emily’s spirit’ and in this she was. Her stripped down style (much hand-held camera work restricted to 35mm frame, soundtrack pared to not much more than the call of birds, the wind’s moan, barking dogs and young Cathy’s extempore singing, sparse dialogue and use of unknown, even non, actors) seemed to get to the heart of a relationship much damaged by the romanticising of previous directors.
Her young Cathy and Heathcliff were for all time; young people fighting their destiny in a hard, harsh world where there was no room for sentiment. Arnold had toyed with the idea of putting Heathcliff in a hoodie and having the setting more high-rise than heights, before deciding to return to the original which I felt was a wise choice. The moors are an integral part of this story.
Arnold’s ‘controversial choice’ (though the phrase surprised her) to cast black actors for Heathcliff worked in as far as Brontë calls him ‘swarthy’ and makes Earnshaw bring him from Liverpool. I don’t think the colour of his skin was important to Brontë; I believe it’s the blackness of his heart which is his defining feature for her. Also by casting him opposite a white, National Front look-alike Hindley who calls him ‘nigger’ (not in the lexicology of the book though a familiar and influential insult by the end of the first third of the nineteenth century) I wondered if she’d done the original a disservice by suggesting his antagonism to this cuckoo in the nest is racially motivated..
Sadly the final third of this adaptation was less riveting. By now one had begun to tire of the ‘arty’ camera work and the older Cathy and Heathcliff seemed to have had the life sucked out of them as they went through the motions their younger selves had so brilliantly conveyed. Despite the odd flicker of their former chemistry, for me this brilliant film ended with a whimper.
