This is a sexy, funny, ravishing and dark revision that keeps Heathcliff’s frightening obsessiveness, emotional toxicity and sadism intact while ably contorting the tale into a decadent, modern, yet still distinctly gothic, romance.
Issues millions of people face everyday are addressed cleverly and poignantly, and never without a hint of humor. Wilde isn’t really interested in sentimentality, either, and her movie hits harder for it.
The first 20 minutes were side-splittingly funny and bitingly observed while keeping the viewer a little off-balance. Think of it as a subversive “WandaVision.” Then a more ambitious story involving parents in the outside world, played by Cristin Milioti and Topher Grace, takes over, and the movie struggles to match its rocket-fuel kickoff.
If you like Charli xcx’s songs and find her to be a unique and uncompromising presence in the often airbrushed world of pop, you’ll appreciate moments of “The Moment.” But that’s it. This is not a fully formed movie. At best, it’s a moderately intriguing pitch.
Fiennes is magnificent, and a scene involving him and Iron Maiden’s song “Number of the Beast” will go down as one of the most buzzed-about sequences of 2026. Were it written for a grisly horror movie, Alex Garland’s climax would fit snuggly into a Shakespearean comedy.