Wuthering Heights Movie Sets Valentine’s Day Weekend Release After Los Angeles Premiere

The Wuthering Heights movie is heading into theaters with a high-profile new adaptation that puts two major stars at the center of Emily Brontë’s gothic romance. Written and directed by Emerald Fennell, the film stars Margot Robbie as Catherine Earnshaw and Jacob Elordi as Heathcliff, bringing one of literature’s most volatile love stories back to the big screen.

The project has generated heavy attention not just for its cast, but for how it frames the novel’s passion and cruelty for a modern audience, while still leaning into the stormy, isolated world that made the original story endure.

Release date, premieres, and when audiences can buy a ticket

The film’s first major public moment arrived with a Los Angeles premiere on Wednesday, January 28, 2026 ET. A separate U.K. premiere event is scheduled for Thursday, February 5, 2026 ET, ahead of its wide theatrical opening.

The Wuthering Heights movie is set for release in theaters on Friday, February 13, 2026 ET, positioned for Valentine’s Day weekend. It is also expected to play on large-format screens in select locations.

Some specifics have not been publicly clarified, including a complete territory-by-territory release calendar outside the U.S. and U.K., and whether all regions will get the film on the same date.

Wuthering Heights cast: who plays who in the new adaptation

Robbie and Elordi lead the story as Catherine and Heathcliff, the famously intertwined pair whose relationship becomes as destructive as it is consuming. The supporting cast includes Hong Chau as Nelly Dean, the household figure who often serves as the closest thing the story has to a grounded observer.

Other key roles include Shazad Latif as Edgar Linton and Alison Oliver as Isabella Linton, alongside Martin Clunes as Mr. Earnshaw and Ewan Mitchell as Joseph. The film also features younger versions of several characters, including Charlotte Mellington as young Catherine, Owen Cooper as young Heathcliff, and Vy Nguyen as young Nelly.

While the main character list is clear, further specifics were not immediately available on how closely the film will track every plot turn and timeline shift from the novel versus streamlining events for a two-hour feature format.

What’s different this time, and why the title styling is getting attention

Even before release, the adaptation has been discussed as a “version” of the novel rather than a strict page-to-screen translation. That distinction matters with Wuthering Heights, a book built on layered narration, time jumps, and competing accounts of the same people and events. A film can capture the atmosphere and the emotional temperature, but it often has to simplify structure, compress timelines, and choose whose perspective dominates.

That’s also why the title styling has become part of the conversation. The film’s presentation signals an interpretive approach: it’s leaning into the idea that any adaptation is inherently a re-telling, shaped by the director’s lens, performance choices, and what a modern audience will accept as romantic, tragic, or unforgivable.

The casting has also sparked debate in the broader cultural conversation around fidelity to classic texts, especially when new adaptations reframe characters that readers have long pictured in specific ways.

Who this affects, and what to watch as opening weekend nears

This release will land differently across groups. Longtime readers, book clubs, and educators who teach Brontë’s work are likely to weigh the film’s choices against the novel’s themes of obsession, class power, and inherited harm. Meanwhile, theatergoers planning a Valentine’s weekend outing are getting a romance that is intentionally thorny, more nightmare than fairy tale, which may shape expectations for date-night audiences.

The film also matters to exhibitors and local cinemas, especially in February, when a buzzy, star-driven drama can draw crowds outside the typical summer and holiday peaks. And for fans of the lead actors, opening weekend becomes a referendum not only on the adaptation, but on whether this pairing translates into the kind of on-screen intensity the story demands.

The next clear milestone is the U.K. premiere event on February 5, 2026 ET, followed by the wide theatrical release on February 13, 2026 ET, when audience reception and box office performance will begin to define how this Wuthering Heights movie sits alongside the many adaptations that came before it.