movie vs the classic

I watched the 1992 version of Wuthering Heights and was greatly impressed with it's representation of Bronte's classic tale. I think one of the most interesting appeals of the movie was that they decided to recast the deceased Cathy Linton as her daughter, Catherine. It was apparent that movie was trying to show the distinct resemblance of daughter to mother, and therefore used the same actress as both parts. Bronte's novel shows a direct parallel between the romances of Heathcliffe and Cathy to that of Haerton and Catherine. Both portraying the wealthy almost snobby, yet likeable women to offset the dark, brooding, melancholy males. There is almost a hope that unlike Heathcliffe and Cathy, Haerton and Catherine may be able to live a life of happiness and true love, unaffected by the societies hierarchy of wealth and status. Since Cathy really has no parental influence (besides Nelly who appreciates the marriage between Cathy and Haerton), they are able to live separate from the prying eyes of family obligations.
A remarkable difference between the text and the movie was the role of Mr. Lockwood. In the text, he seems to play a key part as part-narrator. The ending of the text shows Mr. Lockwood having several indepth conversations with the residents of Wuthering Heights, a narrator of the true feelings of these characters. In the movie, he is kind of the awkward bystander with no real effect on the characters, and his desired romance with Catherine is severely played down. It is also Lockwood who at the end wanders by the graves of Edgar, Cathy, and Heathcliffe to make the last remarks about their deaths.
I also found it interesting how the movie dealt with the death of Mr. Heathcliffe. They actualy showed him being summoned by the "white light" and into the arms of Cathy, to live an eternal life with his true love. The text only shows Heathcliffe's descent into a hazy, surreal-like place where he prepares for his death and constantly feels that he is in the presence of Cathy. The death scene is left to the readers interpretation, we only know what Nelly finds when she comes across Heathcliffe's body, wide-eyed, strewn in front of the open window. The reader gets the sense that he is now in a better place of sorts, but the movie uses theatrics to grab the viewers attention with the death-scene dramatics.
When you compare a textual narration with that of a movie's narration some things become lost, while other things flourish. In the novel, we are unable to see the inner-workings of many of the characters because it is narrated by Mr. Lockwood who only hears things from other characters. We need a Mr. Lockwood in the text to decipher the actions, emotions, the EVERYTHING of the other characters. When we move to the movie versions which really excludes Mr. Lockwood from any major role, it is because the audience no longer needs a major narrator like Mr. Lockwood. We are able to see everything first hand, right from the characters themselves. While in essence we gain a first-hand entry into the very character's lives, we also lose the major narration, and major character in the text, Mr. Lockwood. I personally thought Mr. Lockwood's presence in the text was almost too much, for he was an outsider to this family, just commentating on past tales and current circumstances. In the movie we can actually visually see the character's own emotions living out right before our eyes. The death scene in the end of the movie is so moving because we see Heathcliff gravitating to the outstretched arms of his love Catherine. The text can not refer to this moment because it was a moment just shared between Heathcliffe and "Catherine", and therefore neither Nelly or Lockwood (the two narrators) witnessed the events. Movies definitely have a way to dramatize events that books can not. Books are great though because it is the readers imagination that dictates the visualization of actions and emotions.
I was pretty impressed with this version of the text though, it remained pretty close to the text and really portrayed the characters as I think Bronte intended them to be.