It doesn’t compare to the winter suffering of millions in the blizzard-ravaged Midwest and Northeast, but it was bad. I just saw steamy “Wuthering Heights” sitting next to my mother-in-law.
Here is how it happened. A fan since college of the tragic 1847 novel by Emily Brontë, and original 1939 film starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon, I was less reluctant than usual to see this remake of a tragic romance, so I tagged along with wife Erica, 16-year-old niece Georgia, and Erica’s mom Nancy.
The remake, starring Margot Robbie and heartthrob Jacob Elordi is currently the number one movie in the country, and the theater was packed with women of all ages, and me.
We couldn’t get seats together, so Erica sat me next to mom Nancy and herself next to niece Georgia several rows away. It was okay for a while, but became increasingly uncomfortable after Heathcliff returned from America, only to find his paramour, Catherine, engaged to another man.
Rather than just agonizing and unlike the original film, this version concentrates on the wild, clandestine sex that ensues between Robbie’s Catherine and Elordi’s Heathcliff. They do it in the barn, on the mountaintop, in the kitchen, on horseback, this way and that.
When things got crazy, I excused myself and went down to the lobby bar that the movie theater gratefully provided. It was empty until two ladies who had just seen “Melania, the Documentary,” sat down and started gushing over the torrid “Wuthering Heights,” which they had seen earlier.
Figuring it was the lesser of two discomforts, I returned to my seat and toughed out the bitter end of the movie. The moral of this story, I should have stayed home and watched the Olympics.
Speaking of which, the Winter Games in the stunning Italian Alps were great.
As usual, the pageantry and athleticism were breathtaking. What my old boss, the late, great Roone Arledge, called “The Joy of Victory, the Agony of Defeat,” was the theme throughout.
In skiing, one of the greatest of all time, 41-year-old Lindsey Vonn, was literally in agony after attempting to compete just a week after suffering a torn ACL.
Source: LI Press
