The Raven

A mildly entertaining inconsistent romantic horror, James McTeigue's The Raven situates Edgar Allan Poe (John Cusack) within a demented psychotic murderous tribute to his work and demands that he creates within. As a madperson kidnaps his love interest (Alice Eve as Emily Hamilton) and uses materials from his texts in a homicidal homage, Poe assists Detective Fields (Luke Evans) in his desperate corresponding investigation.  Anticipation leads to discovery but they vexingly remain one step behind the sought after killer and his or her realistic portrait of the literary dead. The time required to psychologically digest the enormity of its impact is vindictively denied as the narrative quickly shuffles from one grizzly chapter to the next.

And the unacknowledged trauma sinks in.

Lying within this structure lies a hidden master/slave dichotomy. If you find yourself working within a environment in which your labour is continuous, giving you little time to think about anything else, and your efforts fail to result in better working conditions, as this pattern is reproduced, and your debt load continues to climb and your forbidden subject of desire becomes increasingly unattainable, an underlying current of motivated pointlessness emerges when the shape-shifting face of capital presents itself, exalting a moribund elixir.

This could explain why The Raven's dialogue possesses a timeless quality which utilizes both 19th and 21st century forms of expression.  By quasi-atemporally refusing to abide by a linear conception of verbal predictability, it subtly manifests this motivated pointlessness while elevating an unconscious ethos which revels in the disruption of contemplative leisure (the 60 hour work week).