Rather than parody or melodramatic spoof, it dissects the cliché of tortured-writer-as-dark-figure and in its place presents a man firmly planted in the space between reality and imagination, and aware of the limitations of each.

| Aug 4, 2024

With one of the most intriguing literary figures of all time and plenty of visual splendor, The Raven is a thriller that shouldn't go unnoticed. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 6/10 | Jun 14, 2023

It’s all very watchable in a low-expectations way, though anyone hoping for a tale worthy of Poe himself should look elsewhere.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Nov 20, 2022

Now it’s decent enough to keep you in your seat, but it never does anything to put you on the edge of it.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 24, 2022

Too ludicrous and irrelevant to be offensive.

| Original Score: 1.5/4.0 | Sep 21, 2020

A gimmicky bit of revisionist history.

| Original Score: C | Jul 11, 2020

Emboldened by an Oscar-worthy performance by John Cusack who, as Poe, is so powerful, so mesmerizing, that there is no trace of Cusack, we see and hear only Poe, The Raven is a masterpiece worthy of the master of macabre himself.

| Nov 26, 2019

John Cusack as Edgar Allan Poe is immensely watchable, but the story is downgraded to a bog-standard thriller.

| Feb 28, 2019

There's no reason to see The Raven. It's an unoriginal plot that you've seen a hundred times before. The performances are lackluster and the direction is uninspired.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Feb 21, 2019

The Raven, however, is very serious, and the dissonance between its dramatic intentions, its events and its execution generates something of a mess.

| Original Score: C+ | Feb 2, 2019

Audiences new to Edgar Allan Poe's work will comes away from McTeigue's trite thriller with little understanding of the man himself, the times he lived him, or his hugely influential canon.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Dec 19, 2018

There is certainly some gore, but I went in expecting a bad action film and what I got was a compelling period piece, an engrossing mystery and a touching romance.

| Original Score: 7/10 | Nov 9, 2018

Edgar Allen Poe gets run through the grindhouse gears in the compellingly illogical The Raven.

| Original Score: 5/10 | Nov 4, 2018

The film is disappointing on two levels: it squandered a cool concept and it ended up a completely by-the-numbers thriller.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Sep 28, 2017

Never pulls you into its weird story.

| Original Score: C+ | Apr 18, 2017

CSI: Nevermore.

Full Review | May 3, 2015

A crudely written and wholly uninspired thriller that's unlikely to win anyone over to the horror master's oeuvre.

| Original Score: 1.5 | Feb 15, 2013

The Raven is a movie with its wings clipped; a murder mystery that feels strangely subdued.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 12, 2013

The problem is that "The Raven" is all surface. The movie is nothing but its fun idea, without much development or ingenuity

| Feb 12, 2013

Even though this film has more than its share of dark, gruesome elements, there is also enough of a sense of playfulness in it to help make it entertaining.

| Original Score: C+ | Feb 1, 2013