Across the 1940s, Hollywood produced a decent chunk of biopics about composers. For another of these, we head to 1945’s Rhapsody in Blue.

As a child, George Gershwin (Mickey Roth) displays a natural ear for music. When he grows to adulthood (Robert Alda), George pursues a career via any means necessary.

This leads him through a mix of jobs but he eventually experiences success as a songwriter. However, George’s focus on his compositions causes issues with his personal life, as he struggles to maintain successful relationships with various romantic partners.

Given the nature of the story involved, one might assume Blue would run about 95 minutes. Okay, since it includes some musical performances, we’ll bump up its likely length to 110 minutes.

Nope. Instead, Blue spans a mind-boggling 161 minutes.

Does a lightweight mix of music, comedy and romance need to boast a running time longer than some epics? No, and this extended use of celluloid makes Blue drag.

This becomes especially true because the film lacks much of a plot. In reality, the lives of the composers at the core of films like Blue lacked much real drama, so those involved need to take ample liberties with the facts.

Though melodramatic, the movie’s ending does at least echo actual events, so I can’t complain about that part. However, Blue invents a non-existent love triangle to give the story some juice.

It doesn’t work. Even with various attempts to spice up Gershwin’s seemingly ordinary personal life, Blue fails to spark much to interest the viewer.

Honestly, George simply offers a really dull protagonist. While Blue occasionally tries to embrace the “tortured musical genius” concept, Gershwin feels far too milquetoast for that theme to work.

Alda delivers a perfectly competent performance as our lead. However, he doesn’t do more than that, so any hopes the actor will spice up the bland role evaporate.

To fill that overly long running time – and give us a respite from the dull main plot – we get a bunch of production numbers. These seem serviceable and no more.

Given the nature of these scenes, Blue really needed to be shot in color. I don’t know why the producers opted for black and white, but the monochromatic photography does the song and dance sequences no favors.

If we got a 110-minute color version of Blue, it would likely bring us a fairly engaging musical biopic. However, this 161-minute black and white film lacks life or engagement.

Note that Blue comes with a disclaimer related to dated/offensive elements in the movie. In particular, the flick embraces “blackface”, as we get two separate segments that use it.

Rhapsody in Blue appears in an aspect ratio of 1.37:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. This became a fine transfer.

Sharpness looked largely solid. Some interiors lacked great delineation, but the image usually seemed well-defined.

No jagged edges or shimmering occurred, and I saw no edge haloes. With a nice layer of grain, I suspected no intrusive digital noise reduction, and print flaws failed to mar the presentation.

Blacks seemed dark and rich, while contrast appeared appealing. Shadows came across as smooth and concise. Across the board, the film looked strong.

While not in the same league as the picture, the DTS-HD MA monaural soundtrack of Blue also worked fine. Speech seemed reasonably accurate and distinct, with no issues related to intelligibility or edginess.

Music came across as fairly bright and lively, though dynamic range seemed limited given the restrictions of the source.

Effects were similarly modest but they showed good clarity and accuracy within the confines of 82-year-old stems. This was a more than adequate auditory presentation for an older movie.

The disc includes the film’s trailer but it lacks any other extras.

A lightweight musical at heart, Rhapsody in Blue suffers from a running time better suited to an epic. This makes the movie drag and turn into a bit of a chore. The Blu-ray delivers positive picture and audio but it lacks supplements. Expect a quality release for a spotty movie.