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Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights

List Price: $14.99
Your Price: $11.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Tom Keogh is wrong
Review: This version far surpasses the 1939 version. The haunting spell that Bronte intended is found here. Ralph Fiennes is near perfect. Juliette Binoche is good too. Together they impel the same emotions that the book does. The 1939 version made me yawn. This version made me cry.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Utterly terrible
Review: This is a really, really terrible version of Bronte's classic book. It is absolutely sodden in film-making cliches, shot in a completely unimaginative way, poorly adapted, poorly cast, poorly acted, and extremely poorly directed. The adaption makes a mockery of the fantastic language of the book by making it into a really overly dramatic cliche, with all the obvious things and extremes used. The casting is terrible - Fiennes does his best but is far too Shakespearian for Heathcliff, while Binoche, though a good actress, is a terrible choice for Cathy - with her French accent shining through, and her cute, totally un-wild nature. Also, the transition from children to adults in the film is a real jump and is totally unrealistic - they look about 35 when they are meant to be 15. I watched this with 10 other people who had all read the book and we all just laughed all the way through, because it is such a terrible film and so utterly cliched in the delivery of the lines, in the use of special effects, and so forth. This really is bad - avoid.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Only Good One
Review: There are at least three versions of this adapted book, those three being the only versions I personally know of, and this one is by far the best. Expecting yet another jaunted version of Emily Bronte's best and most famous book, I taped this movie off of HBO and found that it was one that I would gladly see again. The incredibly beautiful Juliette Binoche easily played both Cathys, and Ralph Fiennes was a surprisingly vengeful Heathcliff. I actually was able to follow along with the book in my lap, unlike most of the other adapted-Bronte-novel movies. The only burrs that stuck in my saddle were personal thoughts of the supporting cast, and nothing that affected the movie itself. This is an excellent rendition, as the general opinion speaks of, and should be shown in any Literature class that wishes to show a version of the novel. As good as any Sparknotes.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: 3.5 stars for a good redition of the entire novel.
Review: I love the 1939 Oliver film but it and all of the other versions of this film never go beyond the first half of the novel and then the very ending, and even then Olivier's version is far happier than the book and the TImothy Dalton version completly changes the entire novel!
While this film couldn't possibly contain all of the novel it does a very good job of it and unlike a previous reviewer I did not find it choppy. The filmakers took the best elements of both generations of this tale and managed, for the first time, to do the entire novel some justice. I would still like to see someone do a minisieres of the entire book someday, it would be worth it.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Worth owning
Review: I have seen many versions of this movie and this is one of my favorites!
The cast was well chosen and you can feel the tension and romance between them. Ralph Fiennes is dark and brooding, just as he should be. Juliet Binoche brings a light to Catherine that contrasts Heathcliff well. The rest of the supporting cast lend just the right touches to complete the picture.
The cinematography is truly beautiul, moving, and draws the viewer right in.
Of course the icing on the cake is Ryuichi Sakamoto's haunting music. I bought the CD "Cinemage", a collection of his movie scores, just to have the main theme from this picture.
If you liked the book, and love a good romance, buy this DVD.
Better yet, buy it for someone you love!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Best Version of All
Review: Finally, a version of Wuthering Heights that faithfully follows the book. While I cast no aspertions on the 1939 version, which did offer Oliver in an excellent portrayal, that film cannot compare to the more honest scenario & acting offered by Finnes & Binoche in the 1992 film. Undoubtedly (in my opinion) closer to what Bronte originally wanted the story to "feel" like.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Classic Tale...Elegant, and Heart-Wrenching
Review: Ralph Fiennes, who is by far one of the most gifted actors of his time, teams up yet again with Juliette Binoche, his costar in English Patient, to make the Bronte tale come to life with superb acting, and vivid imagery,not to mention beautiful,albeit morose scenery. Makes one long to don a velvet cape, and stroll along the moors at dusk alone.Sure, this is a gloom and doom story, but it is just so superbly made...a visual treat.I love the Sinead cameo.Just a fine film.Highly Recommended.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: What?!
Review: This was a very horrible film. The plot was chopped up and scattered, the characters were not allowed to have any depth, and the claim that the film spans the entire book is only true in that it has basic plot points, but leaves almost everything of substance out in between. I was not even a huge fan of the novel, but after this film, I would gladly go back and suffer through Bronte's writing than watch this monstrosity. I am always amazed at how certain directors and screenwriters can get a hold of such wonderful actors (in this case, Finnes and Binoche) and turn them into nothing more than talking manaquins with no personality or depth. The entire time I was hoping that the two of them would just die already so the film would be over. How anyone could enjoy this lackluster production is totally beyond me.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Biased review
Review: A decade old movie finally comes to DVD. Certainly, people must have requested the digital format of this critically trashed movie. But I liked it. Okay, Juliette Binoche has done better work but her chemistry with Ralph Fiennes is worth watching. Fiennes' performance in this movie was the precursor to his Oscar nominated role in "Schindler's List". As for the Bronte novel I've never had the interest in reading, I might read now to see what "fools these lovers be" Puck - A Midsummer's Night's Dream".

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: More is less
Review: This is the second time I've seen a screen adaptation of Emily Bronte's WUTHERING HEIGHTS in the past month. It's not that I'm a Bronte fan. Decidedly not. But I wanted to compare this 1992 version starring Juliette Binoche and Ralph Fiennes with the 1970 production starring Anna Calder-Marshall and Timothy Dalton. An intellectual exercise, if you will.

OK, ok. I just wanted to ogle Juliette Binoche.

I've never actually read WUTHERING HEIGHTS, and never will. So, my understanding of this 19th century soap comes entirely from the two films. A landed Yorkshire gentleman, Mr. Earnshaw, brings home a young orphan boy, whom he names Heathcliff, to live at WUTHERING HEIGHTS with his family, which includes daughter Cathy and son Hindley. Heathcliff and Cathy spend their formative years roaming the wild moors, and become devoted to each other. When the elder Earnshaw dies, Hindley, who hates Heathcliff, demotes him to servant status. In the meantime, Cathy picks up the ways of a lady during a lengthy stay in the manor house of the local magistrate, Mr. Linton, where she first meets his son, Edgar. Returning to WH, Cathy is put off by Heathcliff's roughness and poor hygiene. Now, in short order, Hindley's wife dies giving birth to son Hareton; Edgar proposes to Cathy; Heathcliff disappears; Cathy marries Edgar; Heathcliff returns after years "on the road", now cleaned up and moneyed; Heathcliff exacts vengeance on the Earnshaws and the Lintons.

The most obvious difference between the '70 and '92 versions is that the former considerably foreshortens the original Bronte plot, and ends with the death of Cathy shortly after she gives birth to her daughter, Catherine Linton. In that interpretation, Heathcliff (Dalton) pines away from loss and soon joins her. In the more recent version, Heathcliff (Fiennes) lives on many years to make life miserable for the second generation, i.e. Catherine, Hareton, and his own son, Linton, by Edgar's sister, Isabella. (Why couldn't Heathcliff have named his son "Bob", just to keep the numerous Lintons straight in my mind?)

The '92 WH suffers considerably from only superficially touching on the early years of Heathcliff and Cathy when they came to love each other while running wild over the Dales. It's that bond, broken by Cathy's marriage to Edgar, that causes Heathcliff to snap. Because the '70 version dwells more extensively on these "missing" years, this viewer felt a modicum of sympathy for Dalton's Heathcliff when he gets ugly. The Fiennes Heathcliff simply comes across as a psycho, though the intensity of the actor's portrayal makes his Heathcliff truly scary.

I can't get enough of Juliette Binoche, so her dual roles as both Cathy and her daughter Catherine gave her enough screen time to satisfy even me. Well, perhaps casting her first as a brunette and then a blonde was a bit contrived. But Lady Clairol manages that thousands of times every day, so who am I to quibble?

I'm giving this version of WUTHERING HEIGHTS three stars not because it's lacking in itself, but in relation to the '70 version, which gets the plot's message across in a simpler manner, and to which I gave four stars. Emily Bronte's storyline is just so depressing as it is. If I'm going to watch a chick flick, give me an amusing piece based on a frivolous Jane Austen book. At least it's sunnier in the south of England.

And by the way. What did they farm at WUTHERING HEIGHTS, anyway? Sheep, I suppose. But it may as well have been rocks since we see more of those than wool-on-the-hoof.


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