Wuthering Heights Delivers Strong U.S. Box Office Start Ahead Of Holiday Weekend Debut

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If you’re planning a romantic weekend for Valentine’s Day, the movie Wuthering Heights is getting a lot of attention and is off to a great start at the box office, so it might be worth checking out!

The new film starring Jacob Elordi and Margot Robbie, directed by Emerald Fennell, earned $3 million from previews on Thursday, February 12th, showing in 3,000 theaters across the country, reports Deadline. Presales for the weekend are already at $14 million, suggesting the film could open with between $40 and $50 million. The movie is a fictional love story set in the 1700s.

Before creating Wuthering Heights, Fennell released Saltburn in 2023. It initially played in only a few theaters, but still earned between $315,000 and $322,000 during its opening weekend.

I was really excited to see what Emerald Fennell would do after her work on Killing Eve, and 2020’s Promising Young Woman definitely grabbed my attention. Even with everything going on during the pandemic, the film managed to make a splash – I remember reading on The Numbers that it opened with around $719,305 in sales. It was her first time directing a feature, which is pretty impressive! And rightfully so, she even won an Oscar for the original screenplay, which I thought was fantastic.

I’m a little bummed because when I go to the movies during Valentine’s/President’s Day weekend, Wuthering Heights is going to be competing with a bunch of other new releases. There’s Solo Mío with Kevin James, the animated comedy GOAT starring Caleb McLaughlin, Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die with Sam Rockwell, Crime 101 with Chris Hemsworth and Halle Berry, and even Cold Storage featuring Joe Kerry and Liam Neeson. It’s going to be tough to choose!

The film Wuthering Heights is adapted from Emily Brontë’s only novel, originally published in 1847 under the name Ellis Bell. The director shared in a BBC interview that she first encountered the story at age 14 and, despite some criticism of her casting decisions, is determined to bring her unique interpretation to the screen.

She described the connection between Robbie and Elordi’s characters as a deeply emotional and instinctive one, even suggesting a strong, physical attraction.

Trying to adapt something you care about so deeply into a film is a surprisingly painful process. The book itself contains a lot of intense and often disturbing themes, and that’s why it originally caused such a strong reaction in readers.

Fennell described working on the film as a painful but passionate experience, explaining that she poured her heart into it despite knowing it wouldn’t reciprocate her feelings, a reality she’s had to accept.

Fennell often launches projects to great success, so high expectations are surrounding the release of Wuthering Heights.

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2026-02-13 23:53