WUTHERING HEIGHTS: THE HOUSE OF THE DAMNED (2026)

3 stars

Signature Entertainment. Digital. 19th October

When I saw the recent Emerald Fennell/Margot Robbie version of the Emily Brontë classic book I was struck by the fact that it might as well have been a horror movie. With WUTHERING HEIGHTS: THE HOUSE OF THE DAMNED, director Becca Hirani and scriptwriter Liana Failla have run with this idea.

Heathcliff (Sky Cheema) is moping around the big house – he’s probably depressed because his wife Catherine is dead and haunting the corridors. She’s played by Elle O’Hara, who is something a low budget horror star with films like DEAD RESET, THE BABY IN THE BASKET (both 2025) and the excellent CARA (2024) on her CV. Here she just gets to a be bit scary and ghostly. The servants, especially Joseph (Gordon Joseph Miller) are a bit odd.

Much of the focus is on Lockwood (Ross Townsend-Green) who is the new tenant at the cottage down the road. When he visits the house he is eventually greeted by the brooding Heathcliff, whilst groundskeeper Joseph tells him he should “never have come”. Not exactly friendly.

With a storm on the way Lockwood is offered a room for the night – being shown to his room he gets his first glimpses of the ghostly presence. Later he is attacked through the window, but it turns out o just be a tree branch.

Later we see that Heathcliff is up to something nefarious with body parts. Having decamped to his lodgings at Thrushcross Grange, Lockwood is convinced his landlord isn’t of sound mind and later tells his maid Nelly (Nicola Wright) that he must go back to Wuthering Heights. By way of explanation for his demeanour, she tells him of Heathcliff’s tragic history and of Catherine and their love and the fact she died.

Whilst this no doubt covers some of the beats of the novel (not sure as I have never read it), I have to say it wasn’t entirely clear what was going on some of the time. The odd jump scare but this kind of drags along. Less bodice ripping and more body ripping this plays up the horror elements and blood splatter. There are some interesting accents on show here. The film was shot at Brechin Castle and its grounds in Scotland and this adds to the production values.