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Schultze Gets the Blues
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Metascore
67 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 22 Critics What's this?

User Score
6.8 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 18 Ratings

Your Score
10 out of 10
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  • Starring: Harald Warmbrunn, Horst Krause, Karl-Fred Müller
  • Summary: Schultze has spent his whole life in a small town in Saxon-Anhalt near the river Saale. Schultze's life, divided between work and the pub, the allotment, folk music and fishing, is rudely interrupted when he and his mates Manfred and Jürgen are made redundant. As entropy sets in and maintaining the daily routine deteriorates into a farce, Schultze discovers a life on the other side of the hill. (Paramount Classics)… Expand

Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 15 out of 22
  2. Mixed: 7 out of 22
  3. Negative: 0 out of 22
  1. Christian Science Monitor
    Reviewed by: David Sterritt
    100
    Filmed in a leisurely, understated style, this dark comedy is downright entrancing. A spectacular directorial debut.
  2. Portland Oregonian
    Reviewed by: Marc Mohan
    100
    This deadpan ode to living life to its fullest could be the ultimate crowd-pleaser at this year's PIFF.
  3. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: J.R. Jones
    60
    Krause is completely believeable as the solid old man, and though the story moves slower than molasses, it leaves the same dark aftertaste.

See all 22 Critic Reviews

User Reviews

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Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 10 out of 13
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 13
  3. Negative: 2 out of 13
  1. DavidL.
    8
    Conrad K is simply ignorant and impatient. While this movie will not be mistaken for the greatest all time classic, it will also not be mistaken for pure stupidity. Take your head out of your ass, perhaps some directors may want to change things up a bit and focus the camera on the beauty of nature and place man second. Symbolism at its best. Can be slow at times but so is the point to which this movie is attempting to drive home. I agree with many former reviewers that it is quite admirable for the movie having ended in such a fashion of so little lights and glory and instead how a true retiree's life ends.… Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  2. LesH.
    8
    Great move that shows plain kindness works best and carries much farther in life. Many words not spoken, told the best part of this tale. You never know when or where destiny pulls you. It`s the ride that counts, and I liked this ride! Thanks!… Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  3. ConradK.
    5
    After one or two motionless shots of the German landscape playing the part of . . . the German landscape . . . we don't need a third, fourth, or fifth shot to tell us not much is going on in Schultze's world. It's annoying to have that stationary camera recording, recording, recording, while the actors walk on or off--mostly off--and we sit waiting for something to happen. Perhaps that's what they should have titled this film: "Waiting for Something to Happen." When something finally does happen (Schultze gets to the bayou) nothing really happens because he doesn't get to play his accordion and he don't speak English (or Cajun). So he dies. Excuse me, Mr. Michael Schorr, but I can tell you're not making this for an American audience because you have deliberately obscured anything which might be mistaken for a plot, and you know how much we backward, traditionalist Americans are stuck in our rut of plot and character (ideas coined by another European--Aristotle). Schultze (Horst Krause) IS a character, a gentle one--reminds me of Gert Frobe in "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" without the bluster--but, doggone, give the man a script to act, Herr Direktor. Und Himmel! why must we see him in a Speedo? If you want to watch a stationary camera filming nothing in particular, I would recommend Andy Warhol's "Empire State Building," which ought to cure you of such cinematic compulsions. At least Warhol knew how to aim the camera properly so that his subject filled the frame, rather than cinematographer Axel Schneppat's habit of framing his subjects' faces dead-center, giving us half a frame of German grey sky. If this was intentional, it is not genius, just plain cussedness; if unintentional, it is gross incompetence. Europhiles (and I am one), take note: This film is kind to us Americans, showing us as generous and innocent. But there is no passion in it, as if the director was too timid to take a stand of any sort . . . and isn't that just what's wrong with Europe?… Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes

See all 13 User Reviews

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