“When a madman begins committing horrific murders inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's works, a young Baltimore detective joins forces with Poe to stop him from making his stories a reality.”

I really wanted to like The Raven. I mean, John Cusack was among the silver screen crushes of my youth, Poe is one of the grandfathers of the Steampunk genre, and I do so love a good thriller mystery. The Raven is long on the good concept and short on execution – if you don’t mind the pun. There was in fact PLENTY of execution, as one character after another was murdered, with great spurting fountains of unrealistic blood spray. Yawn.

Cusack’s Poe was delightfully whiney, arrogant and self-righteous .The pub scene with Downton Abbey star Brendon Coyle where the Poet challenges anyone to finish the most famous line of his most renowned work (Poe: “Quote the Raven…”  Bar patrons: “Piss off!”) The scene is bound to become a classic.

The thing I like about his performance is the way that Cusack played against Luke Evans (most enjoyable in The Three Musketeers) as the Detective Fields. Where Cusack wears every emotion and alcoholic tendency on his slightly shabby sleeves, Evans keeps a tight rein on his character – letting his frustrations over the lack of progress in the case and Poe’s inability to keep his hands on his gun simmer away – making his one outburst feel truly decadent, like we have been let in on a moment that the character never intended to give away.

The biggest flaw of the film was how it inexplicably gives up on plot. For example, Detective Fields goes on and on about the giant hands the murderer must have – he checks the size of the hands of many suspects. In the end- the killer is a smallish dweeb. So, the whole plot unravels and makes no sense. OR there is a collection of scenes on a cutting room floor somewhere that would explain all of the plot wrecking anomalies in this film. So, again I say, you may want to hold out for the DVD.

Reviewer Emilie P. Bush is the author of two Steampunk novels: Chenda and the Airship Brofman (a 2010 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Semi-finalist) and The Gospel According to Verdu, both available at your favorite on-line book retailer, on Kindle, and in all other digital formats from Smashwords.com (worldwide distribution).