Wuthering Heights Director Explains Why There's No Nudity In Her New Film
After causing shockwaves with her first two films – Promising Young Woman and Saltburn – Emerald Fennell’s new take on Wuthering Heights is also sure to have anyone of a more sensitive disposition clutching their pearls.
However, while much has been made in the media of the film’s sexually-charged content, it should be noted that, unlike Saltburn, Emerald’s Wuthering Heights doesn’t actually contain any nudity, which she said was a deliberate choice on her part.
During a recent appearance on the podcast Happy Sad Confused, host Josh Horowitz suggested it “might surprise some people” that Emerald’s latest big-screen is offering not an “explicit movie”.
“Saltburn wasn’t explicit, either,” she responded, pointing out the film’s two nude scenes both featured a character who was completely alone, and that “one is about grief and the other is about joy”.
The Oscar winner said: “When we talk about ‘explicitness’, it’s sort of interesting, because it’s explicit because of what we’re thinking.
“But the movies that I grew up with, and the way that they used bodies – and the way that they, in particular, used female bodies – were really explicit because often there was nudity and sex for absolutely no reason. The trick for me is always making people feel that they have seen more than they have.”
Turning her attention to her new film, Emerald claimed: “Wuthering Heights is an extremely sexy book. It’s so sexy. Lots of people argue about that, lots of people feel that it is not a sexy book at all. I believe it is a very sexy book, I felt it was a very sexy book.
“But, you know, nothing [sexy] happens [in the book]. So that’s the other side of things. But, you know, it’s interesting, the perception of something, and the thing itself, are so different.”
When the host told Emerald that she has become known for subverting expectations, citing the film’s opening scene – which viewers are initially led to believe is sexual, before it’s revealed that it’s actually all taking place at a hanging – she claimed: “That is what the gothic is, and that’s what Wuthering Heights is.
“It’s all pain. It’s all pain, but there’s so much pleasure in that pain. And that was the centre of trying to make the movie.”
During a separate interview with USA Today, Emerald claimed: “Things that are sexy often take us by surprise. Maybe some people would argue otherwise, but I’m not interested in anything being explicit. I’m interested in making people feel.”
Lead actor Margot Robbie agreed in the same piece: “It’s funny – Jacob [Elordi] with his shirt off is the most nudity there is. There’s no nudity whatsoever other than that.
“Sometimes, the most provocative moments are when the characters are fully clothed, because there’s just been so much build-up.”
While promoting Wuthering Heights, Emerald has made no secret of the fact that she wanted her film to evoke the feelings she had when reading the novel for the first time as a teenager.
This is what inspired many of the controversial changes she made to the novel’s central characters and story when adapting the source material for the screen.
Wuthering Heights is in cinemas now.