The Raven by, Aaron Charny & Jordan Kulm

Scott, A.O “A Murderer Tapping at His Chamber Door” Rev. of The Raven, Directed by James McTeigue. The New York Times  April 26, 2012

Sharkey, Betsy "'The Raven' has Cusack's Poe swinging like a pendulum" Rev. of The Raven, dir.James McTeigue The Los Angeles Times 27 April 2012

Korfhage , Matthew “I gave her my heart, she gave me a pendulum.” Rev. of The Raven, dir.James McTeigue. Willamette Week. 25 April 2012

Theme and director’s intention

"The Raven"stars John Cusack in a gothic thriller pulled from the tales of Edgar Allan Poe that regrettably falls prey to its grand and grisly ambitions" -Sharkey

“The Raven,” unfortunately, does not settle on just one, preferring the usual moviemaking practice of multiplying effects until they pile up into a welter of breathless incident and preposterous exposition. Poe’s motive in seeking the killer is not just wounded literary pride, but also love, for his sensible fiancée, Emily (Alice Eve). - Scott

is a sort of wish-fulfillment fantasy for gothic-minded 12-year-olds, a Victorian Never-Never Land for the lonely and “misunderstood” in which murders based on Poe’s poems can be solved only by the lovelorn genius himself. - Korfhage

Separate elements and their relationship to the whole

There is a geeky pleasure in matching the on-screen murders to the tales they replicate, as in a Gothic version of “Jeopardy!” “What is ‘The Cask of Amontillado’?” “Who is ‘Marie Roget’?” “What is ‘The Masque of the Red Death’?” - Scoot

Cusack’s lack of likeness to Edgar Allan in either character or physicality must have been sensed by the director, and so he has Cusack’s Poe drunkenly running through a bar quoting his own poetry. - Korfhage

"What is both ambitious and grand is the film's stylish look. McTeigue, working with director of photography Danny Ruhlmann, is only getting better at creating richly textured environments for his characters. He's traded the futuristic London dystopia he mined in "V for Vendetta" for the dark cobblestone streets of Baltimore circa 1849, with Budapest and Belgrade subbing in." -Sharkey

Objective evaluation of the film

Since Poe is widely credited with inventing the detective genre, it seems only fair that he should have a chance to do a little sleuthing of his own. That seems to be the intention of a sadistic murderer whose grisly and ingenious methods are drawn directly from some of Poe’s tales. - Scott

Cusack’s lack of likeness to Edgar Allan in either character or physicality must have been sensed by the director, and so he has Cusack’s Poe drunkenly running through a bar quoting his own poetry. “A drink to any man who can complete the following line: ‘Quoth the Raven….’” A Frenchman, of course, is the one to comply; it is an in-joke about Poe’s transatlantic popularity that would have potentially been funnier if it had not been stepped on by Poe himself in his next line. - Korfhage

""The Raven" is a talky film filled with lots of rambling discourses for Cusack, which the actor handles well enough. It's the mishmash of competing issues and emotions that the character is weighed down with that trips things up. Sometimes Poe is raving mad, as the poet was said to be near the end of his short life, and sometimes he's stone-cold sober, putting his intellect to the task." -Sharkey

Subjective evaluation of the film

And “The Raven” might have worked best as the pilot for a creepy, old-style television series, featuring the writer embroiled in a different one of his own narratives each week.

- Scott

The Raven—similar to director James McTeigue’s previous film, V for Vendetta—is a sort of wish-fulfillment fantasy for gothic-minded 12-year-olds, a Victorian Never-Never Land for the lonely and “misunderstood” - Korfhage

"The film is at its best when Det. Fields is on the case. Evans brings a crispness and focus to Fields that makes the ludicrous believable rather than laughable. It's not enough to solve all of "The Raven's" problems, but it helps." -Sharkey

The film’s level of ambition

Since Poe is widely credited with inventing the detective genre, it seems only fair that he should have a chance to do a little sleuthing of his own. That seems to be the intention of a sadistic murderer whose grisly and ingenious methods are drawn directly from some of Poe’s tales. This homage is horrifying to Poe but also perversely flattering – Scott 

The most interesting thing about history is always the “what if.” What if, for example, Edgar Allan Poe were actually a dashingly romantic, goateed action hero shaped like John Cusack, who gallantly rode gun-toting on horseback to save the woman he loved (Alice Eve) from a diabolical genius? - Korfhage

 
"More pulp fiction than macabre masterpiece, it is nevertheless a nifty idea screenwriters Ben Livingston and Hannah Shakespeare have concocted for director James McTeigue ("V for Vendetta")." -Sharkey

Words you found interesting.

There is abundant blood, feverish overacting, and an atmosphere of hysterical Victorian Americana. - Scott

doe-eyed and stilted  - Korfhage