First look: a fierce gothic classic gets a Valentine’s release
Warner Bros. has dropped the first trailer for Emerald Fennell’s take on Wuthering Heights, and it wastes no time setting the tone: wind-lashed moors, candlelit rooms, and a love that feels more like a storm than a comfort. Margot Robbie plays Catherine Earnshaw opposite Jacob Elordi’s Heathcliff, a pairing built for sparks and damage. The studio will release the film in the United States on February 13, 2026, with international rollouts starting February 11. The trailer arrived September 3, 2025.
Fennell, who won an Academy Award for the screenplay of Promising Young Woman and wrote and directed Saltburn, is both writer and director here. Her eye for class tensions and desire bleeds into Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel, which is set on the Yorkshire moors and turns a childhood bond into obsession, revenge, and ruin. It’s her most overtly literary project yet, but the preview suggests she isn’t softening the edges.
The cast is stacked beyond the central duo. Oscar nominee Hong Chau appears in an undisclosed role. Shazad Latif, Alison Oliver, BAFTA winner Martin Clunes, and Ewan Mitchell (familiar to many from House of the Dragon) round out the ensemble. Behind the camera, Fennell produces alongside Josey McNamara and Robbie. Sara Desmond and Tom Ackerley serve as executive producers. The film is a Lie Still & LuckyChap Entertainment production in collaboration with MRC, with Warner Bros. handling global distribution.
The trailer leans on texture: fog rolling over heather, mud-streaked boots, and the way two people can seem drawn to each other like magnets even when they should stay apart. We glimpse slammed doors, desperate embraces, and the kind of silence that tells you more than dialogue. It’s romantic, but not in the sweet sense—more like peril wrapped in velvet.
Choosing the Valentine’s corridor for a story this jagged feels deliberate. Studios often program a conventional love story in mid-February; this one spikes the punch. The novel’s core—love crossing class lines and the damage that follows—lines up with the themes Fennell has favored: social masks, cruelty, and the way desire curdles when power enters the room.
Why this version could hit differently
Adaptations of Brontë’s only novel have a long history. William Wyler’s 1939 film with Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier turned the moors into Hollywood grandeur. The 1992 version with Juliette Binoche and Ralph Fiennes leaned into classic romance. Andrea Arnold’s 2011 film stripped it back to raw earth and weather. Each one picked a lane: glossy, sweeping, or feral. Fennell’s trailer hints at a blend—sensual and stylized, yet keyed into class and cruelty.
Robbie, coming off a record-shattering run with Barbie and a long string of sharp producing bets through LuckyChap, brings star wattage and a taste for risk. Catherine is no gentle heroine; she’s spirited, self-divided, and often ruthless. That moral jaggedness, if preserved, could be riveting in Robbie’s hands. Elordi has been on a rapid ascent with Euphoria, Priscilla, and his scene-stealing turn in Saltburn. Heathcliff demands intensity without softening the character’s darker turns. He looks physically right for the role, but the real test is whether he can keep audiences tethered even when Heathcliff is at his worst.
Brontë published the book under the pen name Ellis Bell in 1847. It’s a singular, unruly work, and most screen versions simplify it—often focusing on the first generation and cutting the second. The trailer keeps that question open. Will Fennell cover the full arc, or concentrate on the fever dream between Catherine and Heathcliff? The images we’ve seen point to an intimate scale, even when landscapes loom large.
There’s also the matter of tone. Fennell’s movies carry a sly, unsettling hum beneath the surface. Promising Young Woman disguised fury as candy. Saltburn staged privilege as performance art. With Wuthering Heights, she’s dealing with pure emotion—raw longing and sustained cruelty—without the scaffolding of satire. The preview suggests she’s still interested in power: who has it, who wants it, and what love costs when it collides with status.
The supporting cast looks built to do more than decorate the leads. Hong Chau’s recent run (The Whale, The Menu) shows she can turn a few beats into a center of gravity. Shazad Latif brings intensity from roles spanning drama and sci-fi. Alison Oliver, seen in Conversations with Friends and Saltburn, thrives in stories about messy desire. Martin Clunes offers gravitas with an edge. Ewan Mitchell knows how to play menace and vulnerability in the same frame. None of their roles are spelled out in the trailer, but the faces suggest this world won’t revolve solely around the central pair.
This is also a reunion of sorts around a creative ecosystem. LuckyChap backed Fennell on Promising Young Woman and was key on Saltburn, while MRC has been a frequent financing and producing partner on prestige-leaning projects. That continuity usually signals trust: a director allowed to make specific choices, a star-producer backing them, and a studio confident enough to date the film in a crowded corridor.
Key facts at a glance:
- Title: Wuthering Heights (2026)
- U.S. release: February 13, 2026; international from February 11
- Writer/Director: Emerald Fennell
- Leads: Margot Robbie (Catherine Earnshaw), Jacob Elordi (Heathcliff)
- Ensemble: Hong Chau, Shazad Latif, Alison Oliver, Martin Clunes, Ewan Mitchell
- Producers: Josey McNamara, Emerald Fennell, Margot Robbie
- Executive producers: Sara Desmond, Tom Ackerley
- Production companies: Lie Still & LuckyChap Entertainment; in collaboration with MRC
- Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
- Source: Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel
Marketing-wise, the trailer positions the film as a full-bodied gothic romance: winds, walls, and warring hearts. Expect a campaign that leans into the push-pull of desire and destruction, with the moors as both setting and mood. It’s a story built for big screens—the landscape and the faces do the heavy lifting—but it will live or die on whether the chemistry feels dangerous and true rather than simply beautiful.
A February launch doesn’t chase awards season, but it might broaden the audience beyond literary faithful and prestige diehards. Call it counterprogramming against comfort. The source material isn’t sweet, and that’s the point. Catherine and Heathcliff don’t teach you how to love; they show you what happens when love becomes a weapon. If the film carries that through line without blinking, the date won’t matter—people will go to see a storm.