Wuthering Heights

Yoshishige Yoshida's 1988 Japanese film moves Emily Brontë's novel to medieval Japan. The orphan Onimaru is taken into a wealthy household and becomes attached to Kinu, the daughter of the house. The adaptation changes the particulars. The family serves a sacred mountain and the social order is built through religion; the narrative keeps the novel's fury but rewrites its geography and its faith. The images rest on wide, held shots with colour kept narrow. Yūsaku Matsuda leads. The film divided opinion when it was shown. Who it's for: those who like formalist Japanese cinema and unusual adaptations. Who it's not for: viewers expecting fidelity to the novel; the film carries the text deliberately far away.