Emerald Fennell’s provocative reimagining of Wuthering Heights, starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi, arrives on HBO Max on May 1, giving streaming audiences their first chance to see the film that split critics but drew $241 million at the global box office.
The film makes its debut on HBO linear on May 2 at 8 p.m. ET, and HBO Max will also carry an American Sign Language version — performed by ASL Dubbers Leila Hanaumi and Giovanni Maucere and directed by Justin Jackerson — marking the first romance title to stream in ASL on the platform with two dubbers.
Fennell, who built her reputation on Promising Young Woman and the erotic thriller Saltburn, applied the same unsettling sensibility to Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel. She decided against a faithful retelling, stating that her main intention was to “try and recreate the feeling of a teenage girl reading this book for the first time.” Robbie, who produced both Promising Young Woman and Saltburn, stars here for the first time as a Fennell lead, playing Catherine Earnshaw opposite Elordi’s smoldering Heathcliff. The supporting cast includes Hong Chau as housekeeper Nelly Dean, Shazad Latif as Edgar Linton, and Alison Oliver as Isabella Linton.
Warner Bros. secured the distribution rights for $80 million — significantly less than the $150 million Netflix had bid — after Fennell and Robbie insisted on a theatrical release rather than a straight-to-streaming premiere. The gamble paid off commercially: the film opened to $37.5 million domestically and $45.5 million overseas over the Valentine’s Day holiday weekend, for a global launch of $83 million. Its final worldwide total reached $241.3 million, becoming the fifth-highest grossing film of 2026.
Critical opinion, however, remained fractured throughout the theatrical run. On Rotten Tomatoes, 58% of 337 critics gave it a positive review, with the consensus describing it as a film that “might not be the stuff of high literature but is a visually vibrant pleasure.” David Sims of The Atlantic called it “a heaving, rip-snortingly carnal good time,” while Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian dismissed it as “an emotionally hollow, bodice-ripping misfire.” Audiences proved more forgiving, with viewer scores tracking significantly higher than critics throughout the run.
The film’s soundtrack — an original album by Charli XCX, scored alongside Anthony Willis — drew consistent praise across the divide, and Elordi received an Oscar nomination for best supporting actor for his separate work in Frankenstein. He next appears in Euphoria Season 3, also on HBO Max.
