JamesHitchcock
Joined Dec 2003
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There have been a number of feature film adaptations of Emily Brontë's novel, including Spanish, Indian and Japanese versions, but the only two I have seen are this one and the 1992 version with Ralph Fiennes. I won't set out the plot at any length, because the novel is so well-known.
Here the story is told in "framework" form by Ellen, a servant at Wuthering Heights, an old farmhouse on the Yorkshire Moors, to a traveller forced to seek shelter in then house by bad weather. She tells him how Mr Earnshaw, a wealthy Yorkshire merchant and the owner of the Heights, found Heathcliff, a young foundling, on the streets of Liverpool and brought him him up as an adopted son at the family home. Heathcliff fell in love with Earnshaw's daughter Catherine ("Cathy"), but was hated by Earnshaw's biological son Hindley, and when the old man died Hindley treated Heathcliff as a servant. Cathy and Heathcliff were in love, but there could be no question of their marrying, and Cathy eventually married Edgar Linton, the son of a neighbouring landowning family.
The big difference between this version and the 1992 one is that this one essentially only tells half of Bronte's story, ending with the death of Cathy. The original novel, however, also told the story of a second generation- the children of Heathcliff, Cathy and Hindley- which is omitted here but which was included in the 1992 film. The plot of the novel, in fact, is particularly complex, and the version filmed here simplifies it considerably. Bronte set her novel in the late eighteenth century, but the film is set in the 1840s, around the time that she was writing. A similar change was made when Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" was adapted for the screen the following year, and in both cases two explanations have been given for the change. One is that the studio wished to use more flamboyant costumes than the relatively restrained and simple ones of the 1790s. The other is that they had recently made another film set during the early Victorian period and wanted to re-use the sets and costumes.
Heathcliff is played by Laurence Olivier, who was also to play Mr Darcy in "Pride and Prejudice". Superficially Heathcliff and Darcy are quite different characters, but both are passionate men, the difference being that in Darcy's case his passion is restrained beneath a formal exterior of manners and breeding. Given his impoverished early upbringing and his ill treatment by Hindley, there is nothing in Heathcliff's character to restrain his passion in this way, and even in the later scenes, when he has become owner of Wuthering Heights and therefore a "gentleman" by position, we are always aware from Olivier's interpretation that Heathcliff is not a gentleman by breeding; the Liverpool Street urchin always shows though. Nevertheless, Olivier makes him magnetic enough for us to understand Cathy's passion for him.
Olivier wanted his lover, and future wife, Vivien Leigh, to play Cathy, but producer Sam Goldwyn thought that she was not well-known enough in America, and Merle Oberon was cast instead, much to Olivier's disgust. (He and Oberon disliked one another, a dislike possibly stemming from their previous film together, "The Divorce of Lady X"). Nevertheless, Oberon makes Cathy a lovely and enchanting heroine, and any off-screen animosity between her and Olivier does not come through. It is this film, together with that song by Kate Bush, which is responsible for there received idea that "Wuthering Heights" is simply the love-story of Cathy and Heathcliff, when the novel is more complex than that. As for Leigh, she was offered by way of consolation prize the part of Isabella Linton, which she indignantly refused- thus leaving herself free to accept the part of Scarlett in "Gone with the Wind", and make herself probably the best-known actress in America.
Unlike the 1992 film, this "Wuthering Heights" was shot in Hollywood rather than Yorkshire, although there was some outdoor location shooting, something which was not always the case in the thirties and forties, and director is able to capture the wild, romantic atmosphere of the moors which play so important a part in the novel. The 1939 film may not tell the whole of Bronte's story, but it nevertheless works well as a piece of cinema in its own right. 8/10.
Here the story is told in "framework" form by Ellen, a servant at Wuthering Heights, an old farmhouse on the Yorkshire Moors, to a traveller forced to seek shelter in then house by bad weather. She tells him how Mr Earnshaw, a wealthy Yorkshire merchant and the owner of the Heights, found Heathcliff, a young foundling, on the streets of Liverpool and brought him him up as an adopted son at the family home. Heathcliff fell in love with Earnshaw's daughter Catherine ("Cathy"), but was hated by Earnshaw's biological son Hindley, and when the old man died Hindley treated Heathcliff as a servant. Cathy and Heathcliff were in love, but there could be no question of their marrying, and Cathy eventually married Edgar Linton, the son of a neighbouring landowning family.
The big difference between this version and the 1992 one is that this one essentially only tells half of Bronte's story, ending with the death of Cathy. The original novel, however, also told the story of a second generation- the children of Heathcliff, Cathy and Hindley- which is omitted here but which was included in the 1992 film. The plot of the novel, in fact, is particularly complex, and the version filmed here simplifies it considerably. Bronte set her novel in the late eighteenth century, but the film is set in the 1840s, around the time that she was writing. A similar change was made when Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" was adapted for the screen the following year, and in both cases two explanations have been given for the change. One is that the studio wished to use more flamboyant costumes than the relatively restrained and simple ones of the 1790s. The other is that they had recently made another film set during the early Victorian period and wanted to re-use the sets and costumes.
Heathcliff is played by Laurence Olivier, who was also to play Mr Darcy in "Pride and Prejudice". Superficially Heathcliff and Darcy are quite different characters, but both are passionate men, the difference being that in Darcy's case his passion is restrained beneath a formal exterior of manners and breeding. Given his impoverished early upbringing and his ill treatment by Hindley, there is nothing in Heathcliff's character to restrain his passion in this way, and even in the later scenes, when he has become owner of Wuthering Heights and therefore a "gentleman" by position, we are always aware from Olivier's interpretation that Heathcliff is not a gentleman by breeding; the Liverpool Street urchin always shows though. Nevertheless, Olivier makes him magnetic enough for us to understand Cathy's passion for him.
Olivier wanted his lover, and future wife, Vivien Leigh, to play Cathy, but producer Sam Goldwyn thought that she was not well-known enough in America, and Merle Oberon was cast instead, much to Olivier's disgust. (He and Oberon disliked one another, a dislike possibly stemming from their previous film together, "The Divorce of Lady X"). Nevertheless, Oberon makes Cathy a lovely and enchanting heroine, and any off-screen animosity between her and Olivier does not come through. It is this film, together with that song by Kate Bush, which is responsible for there received idea that "Wuthering Heights" is simply the love-story of Cathy and Heathcliff, when the novel is more complex than that. As for Leigh, she was offered by way of consolation prize the part of Isabella Linton, which she indignantly refused- thus leaving herself free to accept the part of Scarlett in "Gone with the Wind", and make herself probably the best-known actress in America.
Unlike the 1992 film, this "Wuthering Heights" was shot in Hollywood rather than Yorkshire, although there was some outdoor location shooting, something which was not always the case in the thirties and forties, and director is able to capture the wild, romantic atmosphere of the moors which play so important a part in the novel. The 1939 film may not tell the whole of Bronte's story, but it nevertheless works well as a piece of cinema in its own right. 8/10.