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Emerald Fennell’s third feature film hit theaters Feb. 13 after a long, high-profile press tour, quickly making it one of the most anticipated releases of 2026 thus far. It stars Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi in a loose adaptation of the iconic, devastating and dark novel “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontë, the middle sister of the famous 19th-century British literary sibling trio, the Brontë sisters.
In the first week of its release, Fennell’s 21st-century take on this literary masterpiece has received quite a bit of flak, whether it be for the movie’s plot lacking depth and essence compared to the book, or for Heathcliff’s casting choice lacking an ounce of melanin compared to Brontë’s intended portrayal.
However, I am not writing this column to review the movie through a critical lens — rather, I am here to critique its score and call out missed opportunities for excellence.
In tandem with the film, British pop star Charli XCX released her companion album “Wuthering Heights,” which followed her critically-acclaimed 2024 electronic pop album “Brat” that infiltrated American elections and defined summers. Riding on the coattails of her album’s unbridled success, it was a brilliant financial decision to make and market this movie with Charli XCX, as her audience spreads so wide and has a clear ability to influence media trends.
Though this choice produced an album reminiscent of her resurfacing hit, “Party 4 You,” which fed fans and listeners goth-toned pining realness, it is a true shame to the art of soul crushing, subversive and viscerally tender romance to not hire Ethel Cain to score this film.
The 27-year-old singer, songwriter and producer Hayden Silas Anhedönia of Tallahassee, Florida, wears the crown as the gothic, tortured and sinister queen of ethereal and haunting tunes. Under the stage name Ethel Cain, Anhedönia has pushed out two full-length albums and an EP in just four years, establishing a flourishing catalog that features insatiable characters in her built world of self-destruction, craving and perverse romance.
“Wuthering Heights” was released by Emily Brontë when she was 27 years old under the pen name Ellis Bell. The novel follows the tumultuous lifelong relationship between the daughter of the estate-owning Mr. Earnshaw, Catherine Earnshaw, and the orphan they took in, Heathcliff. Outside of the obvious parallels between Brontë and Anhedönia — parallels in pen names, age, umlauts in their surnames and the clear ability to transcend boundaries and expectations of romance in their work — both women mastered the art of portraying love not as something soft and easily consumable, but instead as something feral, obscene and ultimately fatal.
In Fennell’s film, her signature jewel-toned cinematography highlights how the setting’s darkness mirrors the brooding nature of Heathcliff and Catherine’s connection. Themes of moral ambiguity, forbidden passion and twisted characters define the movie’s passion; this motion picture demands a score that does not soften its edges or simply underscore its romance. It requires amplification of the dread and hunger of its unlawful longing, highlighting the harsh decay of morality. Simply put, pop is too palatable for this depiction.
In Charli XCX’s first single from this album, “House featuring John Cale,” she makes an attempt to produce a song that sounds harsh to the ear, but it just sounds like an amateur bubble-gum swing at the discomfort and anxiety Cain creates in “Perverts.”
While Fennell’s adaptation mostly underscores sexual tension with smutty love scenes that determine the marketing, Anhedönia is not shy of making sexy yet distorted songs. Her unreleased track “Tongue” sets a sultry and intense scene, one that could have been a perfect background to the lovemaking montage viewers waited an hour into the movie to finally see, pleasing their insatiable need for the two leads’ relationship culmination.
In addition to this versatility that perfectly matches the requests of this film’s themes, Anhedönia’s desire to make and score cinema long preceded her desire to produce music. In an interview with Nylon, she said, “It kinda started backwards. I wanted to make films, but I didn’t have access to film equipment and couldn’t make them.” She then proceeded to describe how she imagines a movie when making an album, forming the record by pretending to score it.
This is why we see so many instrumental sections in Anhedönia’s songs. It’s a true wonder why she has not been booked to produce scores for years now; she has the sheer ability and the flexibility to be a resounding success.
This is not to say that Charli XCX made a bad album or that she did not meet the task asked of her. It is to say, though, that hiring Ethel Cain instead would have made this movie more tonal rather than commercial. Ultimately, that should have been the goal of this “Wuthering Heights” adaptation; the argument that it’s a new take on a classic would have hit much harder if Fennell hired someone just as subversive in the music space and society as Brontë was. The story could have avoided being reduced to pop familiarity, as it is the antithesis — doom, rot and obsession.
Ethel Cain would have understood that to yearn is to decay, decorating this story in a much deeper way. One can only hope Cain will be given a similar story to score the pipeline of a young, forbidden love to fatal wreckage.
Hollywood tends to prioritize profit over mood. It is no surprise that women who make uncomfortable art have been sidelined once again; but this was the chance to honor Emily Brontë’s illicit dial shift. If they only had the guts to take the sonic risk.
Reach Caroline Studdert at letters@collegian.com or on social media @RMCollegian.
