Throughout the Golden Age of Hollywood, a distinctive style of filmmaking was birthed under the control of the studio system. Being produced between the 1930-1960s, the filmmakers aptly utilised each of the key elements of film form in order to augment the emotional weight of the narrative being told.
The films produced throughout this era often shared a handful of common narrative conventions. These included a psychologically defined individual who is caught in a struggle to solve a problem or achieve their goals. There is usually a conflict between this central protagonist and other external circumstances, before resulting in a clear-cut victory or defeat at the end of the film.
This narrative-driven and newly audiovisual style of filmmaking has been broken down into the key elements below, with a few specific examples from Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942) being provided.
Otis Morley’s A-Level Film Studies Blog 