Emma Mackey plays author Emily Brontë as a gloomy, introverted misfit. Most of the narrative details her life before penning her novel, Wuthering Heights, including her uneven relationship with her father and siblings, as well as her reticence to interact with those outside her family. While Mackey does a commendable job, writer/director Frances O’Connor has burdened the film with numerous wasted “atmosphere” moments and too much time focusing on the author’s sullen stares. To make things even more intense, she’s enlisted composer Abel Korzeniowski for a soundtrack that’s overbearing and overwrought. While the movie is never dull, it’s not especially inspring or poignant, rendering Brontë’s biopic less effective than her novel. 
(2.5 / 5)
