The Reel Rejects - WUTHERING HEIGHTS (2025) REVIEW – THESE TWO ARE AWFUL (AND PERFECT) FOR EACH OTHER

Episode Date: April 4, 2026

WAS THIS WORTH THE CONTROVERSY??? Wuthering Heights Full Movie Reaction Watch Along:   / thereelrejects   SALTBURN (2023) Movie Reaction:    • SALTBURN (2023) MOVIE REACTION – WE WERE N...   Gift Someone (Or Yourself) An RR Tee! https://shorturl.at/hekk2 After many hot-takes & much controversy, Roxy Striar & John Humphrey react to and review Wuthering Heights (2025), the bold new gothic romance adaptation directed by Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman, Saltburn), bringing a stylized and emotionally intense take on Emily Brontë’s classic novel. Jacob Elordi (Euphoria, Saltburn) stars as the brooding and obsessive Heathcliff, while Margot Robbie (Barbie, I, Tonya) plays the fiercely passionate Catherine Earnshaw, at the center of one of literature’s most tragic and toxic love stories. Set against the haunting moors of England, the film explores themes of love, revenge, class, and self-destruction as Heathcliff’s obsession with Catherine spans years, reshaping the lives of everyone around them. YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@TheWhirlGirls Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/roxystriar/?hl=en Twitter:  https://twitter.com/roxystriar Intense Suspense by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... Support The Channel By Getting Some REEL REJECTS Apparel! https://www.rejectnationshop.com/ Follow Us On Socials:  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reelrejects/  Tik-Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@reelrejects?lang=en Twitter: https://x.com/reelrejects Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheReelRejects/ Music Used In Ad:  Hat the Jazz by Twin Musicom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Happy Alley by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... POWERED BY @GFUEL Visit https://gfuel.ly/3wD5Ygo and use code REJECTNATION for 20% off select tubs!! Head Editor: https://www.instagram.com/praperhq/?hl=en Co-Editor: Greg Alba Co-Editor: John Humphrey Music In Video: Airport Lounge - Disco Ultralounge by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Ask Us A QUESTION On CAMEO: https://www.cameo.com/thereelrejects Follow TheReelRejects On FACEBOOK, TWITTER, & INSTAGRAM:  FB:  https://www.facebook.com/TheReelRejects/ INSTAGRAM:  https://www.instagram.com/reelrejects/ TWITTER:  https://twitter.com/thereelrejects Follow GREG ON INSTAGRAM & TWITTER: INSTAGRAM:  https://www.instagram.com/thegregalba/ TWITTER:  https://twitter.com/thegregalba Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When WestJet first took flight in 1996, the vibes were a bit different. People thought denim on denim was peak fashion, inline skates were everywhere, and two out of three women rocked, the Rachel. While those things stayed in the 90s, one thing that hasn't is that fuzzy feeling you get when WestJet welcomes you on board. Here's to WestJetting since 96. Travel back in time with us and actually travel with us at westjet.com slash 30 years. This episode is brought to you by FedEx. These days, the power move isn't having a big moment.

metallic credit card to drop on the check at a corporate launch. The real power move is leveling up your business with FedEx intelligence and accessing one of the biggest data networks powered by one of the biggest delivery networks. Level up your business with FedEx, the new power move. I'm often described as the horniest person on the Reject channel that's from you guys in the comments. So apparently that also bodes well for me for this movie. Yes. Without further ado, shall we watch Wuthering Heights?

Let's Wither These Heights, baby. We tried to get me to count. We just watched Wuthering Heights, a very controversial movie from this year that I am excited to dive into. Before we do that, though, thank you to all of our patrons, patreon.com slash the Roe Rejects. We so appreciate you guys. Thank you for going over there. That's where you can sync up with your own copy. That's where Greg and John cover stuff exclusively.

That is where you get discounts on our sick merch, rejectnation shop.com. Azzar. Would you go? Oh, we're picking, we're so loved today. See, we're in the mood. We're in the vibe, the spirit. If you're on Apple, Spotify, 5 star, YouTube,

don't forget to a like, comment, subscribe. I read every comment, so be nice. Yeah. Or else I'll get you like Heathcliff threatened, what? Drones supplied by the helicopter girls. You love to see it. Do you know them?

No. No, it's just a cool name. Cool. The helicopter girls are out here supplying drones. Totally. Shout out to Prepper. Thank you for editing us down. We appreciate, especially movies like this where there's a lot of lust.

It could be a difficult job. So thank you. Thank you. All right. I guess because I'm sure we're going to have a ton of Patreon questions for this and stuff. And I'm sure we're going to have to do more of a deep dive. Did you hate it or did you love it? So that kind of is my initial like just your like.

couple sentence summary of did this work for you to a degree i would say okay uh there was a degree there was a point again i don't have a lot of dogs in the weathering heights fight i don't mind personally that this isn't ostensibly like i understand going into this that this isn't definitive that this is someone's interpolation and their take so i'm not mad that this isn't any number of other things so like i was uh relatively board for the ride she was putting down i think there's a lot of good filmmaking on display and i think that you know like in terms of how it's presented it definitely knows what genre it wants to be of what genre would you call that i mean it's gothic it's it's it's gothic romance but with like a

hot topic lisa frank kind of twist about it or like a tim burtony saturation about it and i mean emerald finnell said like this is weathering heights through the scope of me as a 14 year old girl, you know, reading and, you know, feeling the, you know, big emotional swells of the story. So like as a take as like a very specific, I'm not treating this as definitive. I was like, yeah, I think there's a lot to appreciate about the filmmaking and the talent going into this. At a certain point, I'm like, okay, I get what the movie's doing and I have an idea of how long it is. And so you kind of get used to the repetitive nature of what's happening.

I don't know if this is the deepest take on this material necessarily. I think there are things about the themes from the book that I've heard about that are more present than I was expecting based on people's complaints. There are also things that, you know, I get about, again, turning this into sort of like steamy, sweaty, you know, wistful romance of sorts more directly. So, I mean, yeah, not like a home run, but I thought I was not mad at. I appreciate a lot of what was happening just craft wise

I could see from watching this why any number of people would hate it but at the same time I actually don't I didn't see this being worth the amount of controversy the amount of like oh my God you know unless you are very dedicated to the book

and to that I say there have been a ton of adaptations of this so far and they've been very clear if you follow any of the news which not everyone does that this is not a definitive take this is her take and as such I was like cool I like your take. I don't think it's a perfect take,

but I like what you're doing. Pausing for a second. On the camera, there's a... Oh, we're good. Yeah, we're good. You can see it. Yeah, go ahead.

So, not pausing at all. Not to worry. I like this movie. I'm not head over heels in love with it. Yeah. But I liked it. And, yeah, I like the performance. is it's not one of those movies that's going to really make me think a lot afterwards like it wasn't like

oh leaving me with this and now i have to grapple with all these things you know i i think that i enjoyed it i enjoyed the um horniness of it like i talked about i enjoyed the characters they're very flawed um you know i love that lusting style i think that the best part about this movie is how it shot. The cinematography was unbelievable. The set design, the costume. The craft is great. The craft.

You know, I love that as a person who loves film. It was so easy to love all of those aspects. I like some of the callbacks. Some of the lines are super sexy and fun. The sister character was quirky and weird, and I thought it was interesting. So I liked watching this. I like the audacity. I wish there was more underneath it, I guess.

Yeah, yeah. That's what I mean by. I'm not really going to think much about it because this is a movie about, like, people who get in their own way of being in love and make excuses of why they can't be together. And then they ultimately can't be together because of death. Yeah, people just marked by tragedy and stuck in these generational cycles of trauma and abuse and societal cycles of trauma and abuse. And, yeah, it's a movie watching. You're like, man, everyone here is tragic. And all of them are kind of awful. But I understand. understand. And there's something about that that's interesting and endearing. But again, it's, I think the movie does drag some when you're like, okay, I'm, I get, it's one of those movies where you're like, once you get what it's doing, you're either really on board for that or you're not on board for that. And I was like on board for it. But yeah, I was waiting for it to pick up an additional layer of dynamic or depth or something. Right. Right. Yeah, me too. We actually don't have Patreon questions for this because I think we were shooting it so last

minute because of the release schedule and whatnot. But one thing that I will say, because we also don't have that much time to break into this review, is that, wait, can you go back to what I was? Why would you do that in the middle of my soliloquy? I didn't know that it was pertinent. I typed it up. I was ready. I was not unloaded.

I'm sending it. Back to one, everybody. We're sending it back again. Okay. Roxanne, I bet you were about to drop some huge knowledge on me. I googled something. Guys, no, it's not knowledge I was dropping. It's actually because.

It's because. during your portion when you were telling how you felt you were like because there's so many versions and I actually didn't know that there were so many versions of this and I just looked at Tom Hardy version there's a it looks like a ton like okay the Timothy Dalton one

their Julia Pinoche one and Ray Fonardi yeah which is crazy it seems like there's so many and something that I want us to touch on and make sure that we touch on obviously with the controversy of this film you touched on this a little bit while we were shooting.

I'm kind of with you, John, where I don't know how this works in other versions, but he, Heathcliff sometimes is an abuser and very toxic. And like, I wasn't yearning for or craving him to be a person of color during those scenes. Like, I, I haven't read the book and I don't know, but there was stuff that they did hear that I was like, I don't know. I don't know that that would play is I don't know It's not a flattering look

The movie isn't flattering to almost anybody No certainly not It's weird because yeah I understand how and why you would always want To authentically cast And part of the big problem with Heathcliff Is that he's never specifically To my understanding

To you know The understanding I've gotten from every breakdown I've heard Is basically he's not Specifically named of any particular race But they're frequently referring to him in ways that suggest he is an other of some degree and probably has a darker complexion, darker features. Now, Jacob Allorty certainly is a white guy by all ostensibly.

He does have some of those darker more, you know, kind of ingrained features if you wanted to be like, well, maybe he's Romani or something. You could, you could squint and do that. But it does seem like the wrong take to be that upset about it over. And again, this is a problem with other Weathering Heights adaptations from my understanding. It's not not been righted in certain adaptations from my understanding. This adaptation, I don't really see what's worth being that up in arms about, aside from the fact that it would have been a cool opportunity, a good opportunity, a deserved opportunity for an actor who better fits the description. But again, being that this is very much being an interpolation and being very much in Emerald Fennell's own milieu.

I'm like, I kind of am not upset when you take liberties, like that in that context. I also thought that Jacob Lurdy and Margar Rabi had really, really powerful chemistry. More than I expected based off what people said. Yeah, I thought that they did. And I thought so on the press circuit, too. Here, John, I officially grant you access to it now that I don't need to use my cheat sheet. You have full rights and authority. I appreciate it.

I want this power over you. The only, I mean, the husband. was kind of nice. He was fine, yeah. But then, like, you know, to not go see your wife because Nellie says not to. You and I seem to have totally different takes on Nellie. I like Nellie a lot. I get how at times, yeah, what she's doing isn't good or great, but she seems like

the one character who's very plugged into all the circumstances, who has been othered in her own way due to the circumstances so she can see through the bullshit of the circumstances in some ways. Totally. She's not the worst character in the movie. I just By a country mile She was way less hateable

Than most people She just started pissing me off at some point Because I was just like Oh god But remember in the beginning I was like everybody is so mean to Nelly Stop being so mean What is other than saltburn

And promising young woman I thought that Emerald Felt did another movie that I liked Did you remember? She's pregnant Barbie In Barbie From Barbie I mean yeah

These three movies are the ones I'm aware of And I mean like I would say that yeah having only seen saltburn and this now and careful how you go is a short that she directed but yeah it's just these three

I mean salt burn is really fun in a twisted way but it's like so hallucinatory and it's like got this kind of hypnotic pace about it and it's a little more rambunctious whereas this is steeped in a, it's a very deliberately paced movie it's steeped in a tone that I

associate with again these kinds of period pieces these kinds of period dramas, these kinds of gothic romance stories. It's like Jane Eyre is you're all out in the countryside. It's dim and it's wet and everyone's yearning and repressed and isolated and all that shit. And this moves like that. It's just that, yeah, because of that, it's way more deliberate. So it's a little harder to like just get caught up in the sensory of it,

even though it's constantly presenting you with gorgeous and striking and often unsettling imagery. And coloring. Yeah. And even the grime or the fog or the wet is like picturesque somehow. People at home are screaming at me right now. Thank you. It's Killing Eve is what I was thinking of. She's the showrunner and creator of Killing Eve.

Oh, okay. Which I absolutely knew and completely forgot to say. Oh, fascinating. And that's why it didn't just come up in the director movie search. What about anything other than Kathy and Heathcliff? Like, do you care about any? You know, we had that other, like, very sexual scene with the two people who were. worked at the house and then we find out from him that actually she ended up leaving to be with

somebody. We had the sister with the doll stuff. We have the dad as the drunk. That's kind of the whole group of people that we had. Did you care about any other storylines? Yeah. I mean, I thought everybody was interesting to a degree. I mean, the dad I thought was very interesting in that I'm used to that character in this

kind of story being. awful and I mean he's got hell of demons but like you know his vibes who were kind of interesting and he was more like affable than you might expect uh yeah but he's but not a great guy no

I mean interesting character I'm the most I'm the kindest man of the world or something like that I'm the most kind right as he starts a beat on Heathcliff uh yeah yeah I guess I was most curious to be like what's Nellie's story really like because she's been the fly on the wall for so much of this and she's getting like, you know,

the servants, even the people hired to be the staff are like talking shit to her and everything. So I was like, what's your story? She was so annoyed with everybody going down. Like every time that Kathy would cry, she'd be like, ugh, stop crying. That whole thing, you love to see me cry. You love to cry.

Yeah, I love that. And it's true. Kathy's annoying as shit. Like, Kathy has everything she ever wanted and a bazillion dollars now and all the dresses and she and a guy who's in love with you know she has everything and and nellie's like oh stop crying so i get they need the toxicity it's like as much as you pretend you want to be free of the suffering and as much as like a couple misunderstandings have led to this like you also it doesn't seem like from what we know about you that

you could live without it right you've known it since you were kids and to that but i really love them as kids i actually like their chemistry a little bit more than the margot rob was that Owen cooper and uh i thought Margo Robbie and Jacob The Lordy had... It was Owen Cooper. Damn, okay. He, I mean, he literally won every award for adolescence.

He was so fucking amazing in that show. That was the show with all the one-shots. I kept hearing about it. He was incredible, and I was like, it looks like him,

but older. It's so weird because these came out back-to-back, but look how young he looks here. So I was, like, having a hard time picturing it.

Anyway, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. No, I really like them, and I liked that passage of the movie, maybe the most, just because it's the most, like, bright and optimistic.

You could see how, possibilities exist before all the tragedy strikes or is paid off. And I liked Margot Robbie and Jacob Allorty pretty well. I get some of the complaints that their chemistry isn't always like, I can think of better pairings. I loved their chemistry. But I did like them and I felt some stuff and the torture between them. I think there's maybe a little bit more that I could have felt from that in that I feel like this was a pretty good match of talents. I could see a purport. I could see a perfect match of talents beyond them. But I, again, was led to believe that they wouldn't have chemistry.

And I thought they had some chemistry. I never heard that they didn't have chemistry. I thought that their chemistry was gangbusters. I am surprised how little I feel like talking about it. Like how little there is to talk. It just wasn't that deep. It was just not that deep. But, okay, let's get some trivia before we get out of here because we got to get going.

Donald, what you got? What do we got? This was interesting. There's some trivia on this. The film was largely shot in VistaVision, making it one of the few 21st century productions to use this revived format. That's a fun thing.

That's cool. Looked amazing. The kitchen ceiling measures 6 feet 4 inches, slightly shorter than Jacob. A Lordy's height of 6 feet, 5 inches. According to the production designer, Susie Davies, this was intentional. Heathcliff can never stand upright in the house

he ultimately owns, reflecting that he never truly belongs there. That's interesting. It's like craft choices like that. Yeah, that's really cool. A friend of mine had said, Like this has like a Tim Burton equality. And like while it is not getting too in your face with it,

I do appreciate that this has some like fantastical flourish in some of the way that like the, the way Wuthering Heights itself is presented and these like big stone carved out formations and stuff like that. You almost, or when you first see the lawn at that the Linton's place and you're like, it looks like Wonderland in the way. There's like an element of fantasy that's kind of cool. Or when all the bottles build. up for the father's death and it's like all the green bottles on both the sides and it's like that's an interesting choice interesting choice and that was about the one shot where i was like this looks like some kind of cg tableau that you did because the scale of the bottles and stuff but still like an interesting shot and yeah still like a movie that is like it's weird watching this and the bride

i haven't seen that yet i'm covering it for the challenge not going to say much specific uh there are two movies that have garnered a very specific polarized response from a female auteur that is, you know, doing a number of psychosexual, among other things. And it's been fascinating to watch as like people come down on one side or the other for either. And I think this in some ways, because they have been compared a little, is like a steadier movie, is like a way more composed, deliberate movie while the other one is a bit of a shotgun blast and is doing like a bunch of audacious things at once. it's fascinating I think this is interesting we don't

the film adapts only the first half of the novel and does not continue into the next generation after Catherine's death I would be curious what happened to Heathcliff after this yeah well and yeah whatever this means by next generation

because again I've heard the book has to do partly with you know healing generational traumas or confronting them and things like that and certainly we get the effects of them but we don't really again leaving off with just the tragedy of Heathcliff and the sort of Romeo and Juliet

Esm of Heathcliffin. It didn't feel like that. I wish it did at the end feel like Romeo and Juliet where you're just like, oh my God. I didn't care as much that she died as I expected to because I was like, where are you going to go from here? Like, so, yeah, I did. I liked the movie, but I do think for a lot, I probably am the target demo for this movie. And if I didn't, if it didn't knock it out of it. of the park for me.

Emerald Fennell's stuff knocks it out of the park for me. And this did visually. And I like the chemistry. I just, I wish the, like, after promising young woman, I was like, oh my God, I need to talk to five people about this. Like, holy, that thing, what did that mean? What did this mean?

What did that mean? Yeah, that's why I'm being vague because I don't want to, you should watch. I don't want to destroy it for you. And after salt burn, it was like, do you remember this scene? Do you remember this scene? Oh, my God, but that thing. And I reacted to that for this channel.

This is not something that, like, I probably will, ever talk to anybody about other than like oh it looked cool yeah i guess that's the thing is like i like i like that they've been so upfront about like this is her interpolation this is her take this is through the lens of me as a 14 year old reading this i love that and i think it's cool to do that i think we should maybe embrace that more with stuff like this and yeah i would agree it's just like it's there's so much great craft on display and it makes me sad for emerald finel because when this came out obviously everyone's like shitting on it and they're like oh it's awful it's an abomination it's a complete affront to the novel that's been adapted

a bunch of times already and I feel like I watch this and I'm like shit give her more work I want you know what I watched this I had this thought during the movie and I didn't say it out loud but I like this makes me go okay from what I know about your movie so far I want to see you direct something that you wrote with like a great script collaborator yeah if you find a writer who can add that

extra layer of depth because yeah it's like saltburn is an overly deep riff on a talented Mr. Ripley, Eat the Rich movie, but it's got enough other shit and pacing stuff to like kind of get you past that if you're inclined to be with it. Whereas yeah, this one does drag at points because you're like, okay, I get it.

Yeah, I think it could have been 15 minutes shorter too, but I'm so with you. I want to see more Emerald Fennell stuff and like I want to see her whatever next chat, like I will watch every movie she does just because I'm a big fan. Yeah, people were so mad. I'm like, no. I'm not mad. Like you can, I

get having issues with the writing of the adaptation, but like as a director man, I like watching her stuff a lot. Me too. She's got a lot of style, a lot of grip on the- You need to do promising young woman. I would love to. I'm nervous because it sounds, yeah, like everyone I know who talks about it ever says like it's an uncomfortable confrontational watch. But also that's a lively, beautiful, underrated part of art even when it's uncomfortable.

Well, how uncomfortable are you right now? let us know Donald, any final words for the people or any final jokes? Oh, no. Kids got jokes today. No, we withered the heights.

There we go. We weathered the storm. He got his slutty earring and his little gold tooth and they offiled each other to the end. You called this ear and slutty. I was like, what is happening? Got a little earring,

little gold tooth man. Team Nelly all day. I liked him with the long air better. I can't lie. And he grew the beard. We didn't get an awful fake beard. I don't think for much of any. of this.

Skin walls, absolutely insane. Yeah, you hated the skin walls. I kind of dug the skin walls. I'm 50. I thought the skin walls. I was into the skin walls. That house is like a fantasy play.

It's like there are new rooms the further you get into the movie. And then I was like, is that a light blue room and a dark blue room? Or those are the same room in a different lighting. And this room's like all swayed or all like velour or something like that. Yeah.

This was a walk through that house. This was a craft tour de force. It was nicely. it sounded nice in the writing I think the writing could have been a little deeper, a little better I think the movie could have been tighter but yeah I'm glad we watched this and I thought it was an interesting time

and there was a lot to chew on yeah I guess I don't have very strong feelings about this movie like to find I'm like it good I like some stuff about it see some complaints about it I think some of the little controversy is overblown

yeah so let us know what do you guys think be cool be kind and we'll see you next time later rejects Thank you.