The Roaring Twenties

Raoul Wlash - 1939
Wlash uses a pretty mobile camera, with some lovely flowing moves that establish the space then move closer into scenes, the cut only coming when the SRS starts. What I really liked about the look of the film was its architecure, and the chracters relation to it, often in longish shots. The actions are slightly stilited, and there is a wonderful sense of unreality about some of the sets, huge blank walls, at one point they seem to turn up on the set of 'The Trial', or maybe 'Metropolis'. There is something pleasing surrealist about a number of these scenes.
The story arc is generally of the classic gangster movie. In fact, one montage I'm pretty sure uses shots from 'Scarface'. I should talk about the montages. This is a self-conscious gangster movie, using all the epoch's trappings, and the montage of direct, superciliously grand narration flies us through impostions of scenes. Each element is way clearer, and probably a bit slower, than in, say, Russian montage. But, as with all these film, pleausre in the elegance.
Walsh, I have read, gets a lot of credit for little details; there are some nive touches here, little asides from one to another, but I largely found the studio setting too simple for a huge amount of this. Nevertheless, the psychologies are complex; some actions are not the obvious ones taken, all for the better.