‘Schultze Gets Blues’ and also gives them

Movies don’t get much more minimal than “Schultze Gets the Blues,” yet it clocks in at 114 minutes, which makes it a tough go because so little happens. Filmmaker Michael Schorr places a great deal of faith in the efficacy of drollness reduced to its driest tone, but “Schultze” is simply too tedious and stretched out to be amusing. Had Schorr brought in his picture at 80 or 90 minutes “Schultze” might have been a different story.

Schultze (Horst Krause) and fellow salt miners Jurgen (Harald Warmbrunn) and Manfred (Karl-Fred Muller) are given early retirement, and they are at a loss as to what to do with their lives in their small town in the Sachsen-Anhalt region of Germany. Schultze’s friends have wives, and at least the stocky, big-bellied Schultze has his accordion. One day, while station surfing on his radio, Schultze hears zydeco music for the first time, and at the 50th anniversary celebration of the local music club he unexpectedly segues from polka to zydeco. Eventually, Jurgen and Manfred launch a fundraising campaign to send Schultze to their sister city’s annual music festival in Texas.

More than an hour goes by before Schultze arrives in Texas, where he has a series of pleasant encounters, rents a motorboat to ply the Louisiana bayous and along the way hears lots of zydeco music -- but even though Schultze has brought along his accordion Schorr denies us even the small pleasure of watching him playing along with the friendly Cajuns. The second half of the film works better than the first simply because there’s a little more going on. Krause’s Schultze seems sweet natured and thoughtful, but audiences don’t really get a chance to know him. The film’s soundtrack is available, and listening to it has to be more entertaining than struggling to stay awake for “Schultze Gets the Blues.”

*

‘Schultze Gets the Blues’

MPAA rating: PG for mild language

Times guidelines: Suitable for family audiences

Horst Krause...Schultze

Harald Warmbrunn...Jurgen

Karl-Fred Muller...Manfred

Anne V. Angelle...Aretha, the houseboat lady

A Paramount Classics release of a filmcombinat Nordost GmbH & Co. KG production in cooperation with ZDF-Das Kleine Fernsehspiel. Writer-director Michael Schorr. Producers Jens Korner, Thomas Riedel, Oliver Niemeier. Cinematographer Axel Schneppat. Editor Tina Hillmann. Music Thomas Wittenbecher. Costumes Constanze Hagedorn. Production designer Natascha E. Tagwerk. In German and English with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour, 54 minutes. Exclusively at the Westside Pavilion Cinemas, 10800 W. Pico Blvd., West Los Angeles, (310) 281-8223; and University 6, Campus Drive & Stanford opposite UCI, Irvine (800) FANDANGO, 143#.