Films set in the 1930s

The Sting

God's Little Acre

O Brother, Where Art Thou

Paper Moon

Pennies From Heaven

John Ford's 7 Women was set in 1935. I just reviewed it.

Bound For Glory (1976) -- David Carradine as 'Woody Guthrie'

The Natural (1984)

takes place mostly during the 1939 baseball season

How nice of y'all to leave Chinatown for me to mention. 

Aside from all its other great attributes, its period replication is impeccable: on-the-money as far as clothing and grooming, architecture and decor or even the tiniest little details like a driver's licence or product packaging. Roman Polanski has said that among his aims was to make a film that looked as though it was made in 1937 with 1973-74 film, camera and lighting technology. And among the reasons it succeeds so well in this regard is its subtlety: everything is just enough to be convincing without visually beating a viewer over the head with an overabundance of vintage cultural references; it all feels genuine and organic. And all done without benefit of tricks like matte painting (let alone CGI). What you see on the screen was what actually remained of 1937 Los Angeles at the time; find the right locations, frame them carefully and shoot what was there. 

I will admit that there are three or four little visual anachronisms that briefly find their way before the camera lens, but they're things you really have to look for. 

It wasn't until the end of the '60s that film makers started getting serious about making all the details right. Films like The Carpetbaggers, Harlow and The Cincinnati Kid were still afflicted with what I call "'60s-itis" when it came to replicating the '30s, especially where leading ladies were concerned. It's easy enough to get autos, for example, of the proper period, but stars like Carroll Baker and Ann-Margret slinked through those films in clothes, makeup and hairstyles no stylish woman would even have contemplated in the mid-'30s.

Bonnie and Clyde, otherwise quite authentic-looking, completely misses the mark when it comes to Dunaway and her 1960s hair and makeup (I won't even go into Streisand and her Sassoon-style Funny Girl look). 1969's They Shoot Horses, Don't They was among the first that made a real effort. 1973's Paper Moon came even closer, and when Chinatown was released the following year, the attention to authenticity in every last detail - insofar as it was possible to achieve - was one of the things that impressed me, and it raised the bar for films like Day Of the Locust that were to follow.      

The Remains of the Day, 1993
Death on the Nile, 1973
Suddenly, Last Summer, 1959
The Grand Budapest Hotel, 2014

...and you might as well add "42nd Street"

Incidentally, I own a framed lobby card from the film "Goldiggers of 1933" which features Joan Blondell in the upper left corner and in the center, a shot of those gorgeous lady dancers. It is one of my prized possessions.

THE CARDINAL (1963)

Several decades, but the final segments take place in:

1934 -- Georgia, USA
1938 -- Vienna, Austria