There is no way Wuthering Heights: House Of The Damned is a good movie, but for a bad movie, it does have some class. The production design by Christy Louise is very impressive, dressing up the ancient locations in an ornate fashion. The fashion works too, with excellent costumes designed by Francesca Fletcher, with everyone dressed to the nines. Her work on the vanishing lady in black with the veil is the scariest thing in the picture, generating a lot of promise early on. That this promise is trodden upon doesn’t stop it from looking great. However, it also reminds me of Andy Milligan, the Long Island filmmaker who would film his zero-budget horror movies in England to add some class to his brand of crap. However, moldy old castles can only help so much, especially if the occupants outmold the surroundings.
“…moldy old castles can only help so much, especially if the occupants out mold the surroundings.”
Hirani at least highlights the most gothic aspect of the Brontë source material: the doomed couple fit only for each other angle. That Heathcliff and Catherine are both far too dark for this world, yet perfect for each other, makes the pair ripe for the Gomez and Morticia treatment. Instead, Wuthering Heights: House Of The Damned just makes Heathcliff a psycho prick, and gives us a Catherine who is dead. Also, Townsend-Green strikes exactly the wrong chord by playing Lockwood for laughs. The whole stuffy-as-funny makes his suffering impossible to take seriously. He comes off as a hifalutin Mr. Bill, there for comic relief from watching him get clobbered repeatedly. And I mean repeatedly.
The biggest problem with Wuthering Heights: House Of The Damned is how it just goes into the murk and stays there. Once it gives you a taste of its brand of cruelty, it repeats the brutality until the clock runs out. It ends up being one note, like toast with too much Vegemite on it. At one point near the end, the audience is treated to squeezing boils FX, in close-up. Imagine the planning and preparation for “Boil Day” in the production, now try to picture how that didn’t send up a warning flare. As Nina Garcia says on those fashion competitions: “Your level of taste concerns me.” Wuthering Heights: House Of The Damned ends up being a long slog up and down Buggery Hall until you fall flat. May make a decent sleep aid.
"…a long slog up and down Buggery Hall until you fall flat. "
