An early TV attempt to do justice to the classic novel in 95 minutes doesn’t quite come off, although it has the correct Gothic chills by the end.
Claire Bloom is a radiant, free-spirited Cathy, although her accent is a bit wayward. As her Heathcliff, Keith Michell smoulders with rage, passion and arrogance, but he would improve in acting range over the next decade.
Rounding out the cast, David McCallum as Edgar, June Thorburn as Isabella (her decline from flighty and flirty to desperate is sad to see), Jean Anderson as Ellen, Patrick Troughton as Hindley, and Ronald Howard as Mr Lockwood – his entrance to the house in a driving snowstorm is well-realised, even if we do realise it is a studio set.
This Rudolph Cartier production was showing as part of the BFI Gothic season. His production of Anna Karenina from the previous year, also featuring Bloom, is available on DVD, but this Wuthering Heights is sadly locked in the archives.
You can read more about this production at Screenonline.
I apologize if you’ve already reviewed this, but what did you think of the 1970 version of WH with Timothy Dalton and Anna Calder-Marshall (if you’ve seen it)?
I have seen it, but a long time ago so I would need to revisit it for a proper review. However I do remember that it is fairly faithful to the first part of the novel (as most film versions do, it does not address the second generation of Lintons and Heathcliffs) and that Julian Glover is a rather unsympathetic Hindley. Ian Ogilvy and Hilary Dwyer are the Lintons and I suspect that now viewing them in Wuthering Heights would be very different as I am familiar with their work in the earlier Witchfinder General. And there is quite a bit about the young Heathcliff and why Mr Earnshaw brought him from Liverpool in the first place. Dalton is not as menacing as some Heathcliffs but he’s good here, as is Calder-Marshall, although she looks older than him.