Wuthering Heights is often referred to as one of the greatest love stories in literature, but now that it’s one of the latest book-to-screen adaptations on the 2026 movie schedule, how much is the movie starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi really going to make us swoon? Writer/director Emerald Fennell has previously revealed her hopes to specifically make it this generation’s Titanic, but it shares one big difference with the epic: it’s rated R.
Emerald Fennell Shares Thoughts On Wuthering Heights MPA Rating
When CinemaBlend’s Hannah Saulic spoke to Emerald Fennell on the movie, she discussed her thoughts on the movie’s R rating. Was she conscious about James Cameron’s movie being PG-13 rather than R? In her words:
God, what a good question. Well, I think to be honest, when it comes to ratings, I always find it a little bit baffling because I don't think— it's much more of a romance than I think people are expecting. And so, I think that lots of teenagers will be able to watch this movie as long as an adult brings them. And I think you just have to make the movie that you want to make that feels right to you and then, not worry too much about things like ratings.
As it’s been since 1968, an R rating means that you must either be 17 or older or accompanied by someone who is. Now, based on what we’ve seen about Wuthering Heights, I don’t know that I would have let my parents take me to see this if I was under seventeen right now, but she makes a good point here about it being important as a filmmaker not to let ratings guide her storytelling.
In her comments, she also speaks to the movie’s reputation pre-release. So far, early reports called the film “aggressively provocative” and when Margot Robbie recently recalled screening it with a bunch of her friends they were “frothing at the mouth”. According to the writer/director, the movie might not be what people are “expecting”.
Why Is Wuthering Heights Rated R?
If you’re wondering why exactly Wuthering Heights has been classified as an R-rated movie, honestly it has fewer reasons to be R-rated than Titanic. Here’s the official reason, per Film Ratings:
Rated R for sexual content, some violent content, and language
To contrast, the 1997 epic is PG-13 for “disaster related peril and violence, nudity, sensuality and brief language”. I don’t mean to disappoint the moviegoers looking for a scene in the vein of the famed “paint me like one of your French girls” moment, but per an interview with USA Today, Robbie said “Jacob with his shirt off is the most nudity there is” and “the most provocative moments are when the characters are fully clothed, because there's just been so much buildup.”
You can check out Wuthering Heights yourself (and decide if it earned that R-rating) when the movie hits theaters on Friday, February 14.
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