Wuthering Heights

An orphan named Heathcliff is taken in by the wealthy Earnshaw family and moves to their Yorkshire estate, Wuthering Heights. He forms a fierce bond with his foster sister Cathy, and their connection reshapes everyone around them. When social pressures push Cathy toward a secure marriage to Edgar Linton, Heathcliff withdraws, vows to reclaim what he believes is his, and begins to cultivate a plan of revenge and longing. The house and its moors become a stage for love, jealousy, and the corrosive pull of pride as two generations wrestle with the consequences of such passion. Wyler keeps the drama intimate even as the landscape looms, drawing out raw emotion from his performers, creating room for viewers to interpret conflict.

Directed by William Wyler, this adaptation pulls from Emily Brontë's novel with a screenplay by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier. The film, produced by Samuel Goldwyn, released in the 1930s to strong audience interest.

On screen, the brooding Heathcliff became a template for the darkly tormented romantic hero, while Cathy's intensity anchored one of cinema's best known tragedies. The film helped solidify Wuthering Heights as a touchstone for moody landscapes and doomed passion, influencing later adaptations and performances. Oberon and Olivier defined the era.

Critics of the time praised Wyler's control of atmosphere and the performers' intensity, highlighting the emotional gravity and the film's moral ambiguities. The story foregrounds class and desire, showing how social codes clash with passion and revenge, while leaving room for mercy and remorse to surface slowly in final reels.

Box office data from 1939 is not consistently documented, but the film functioned as a high profile release for Samuel Goldwyn and performed respectably in the United States and abroad, reflecting audiences' appetite for lush period romance at the time.