Director on 'primal, sexual' film adaption of Wuthering Heights

The film director Emerald Fennell has revealed details about her “primal, sexual” adaptation of Wuthering Heights after criticism over the film’s casting, erotic trailer and “aggressively provocative” screen tests.

- Hollie Richardson

Speaking about her film for the first time at the Brontë women's writing festival at the weekend, the Oscar-winning director said Emily Brontë’s twisted classic “cracked me open” after reading it at 14 years old. “I’ve been obsessed. I’ve been driven mad by this book,” she said at the Brontë Parsonage in Haworth, West Yorkshire. “I know that if somebody else made it, I’d be furious. It’s very personal material for everyone. It’s very illicit. The way we relate to the characters is very private.”