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Going Straight is important as one of the very few Norma Talmadge vehicles that can be seen on screen today, but there's a bit more to this movie than that. Talmadge is fine, to be sure -- she acts up a storm in her quiet way and she looks magnificent, but there are also elements in Going Straight that may appeal to fans of film noir, as well as German expressionism. Though it predates the advent of that movement in Germany and was, in any case, made in America, there are shots and scenes, and close-ups, in particular, during the robbery attempt early in the movie and the criminals' attempts to flee from the police, that seem to herald the classic treatment of crime subjects in the decades to come. That said, there are also moments that are overly melodramatic and the stuff of pure bad matinee, and some of Ralph Lewis's acting is of the worst community theater histrionics -- one isn't surprised to learn that he was once a leading man for D.W. Griffith, but he apparently didn't evolve in his acting style with the times. It's also interesting to look at some of the topical subtexts that seem to run through the movie -- amid the melodrama, the makers have struck parallels between the lives and lots of the two male leads; Ralph Lewis and his family are seen living in the lap of middle-class luxury, his children indulged and happy, playing with their pets; while the poor waif (played by a very young George E. Stone) that Eugene Pallette's Briggs looks after is seen working himself to exhaustion and clinging for warmth to a poor, half-starved dog at the flophouse where they both sleep; the makers seem to want to make a social statement of some sort here, which is an interesting detail in what was obviously intended as a melodrama. That waif will also play a key role in the denouement, and serve as something of a symbol of hope in this nicely wrought and written story, which probably deserves to be better known. For all of its shortcomings as a crime drama or a melodrama of the old school, Going Straight can't quite be considered a classic, but its more sophisticated elements will resonate well with modern viewers.