FILM FRENZY

Sidney Poitier and Elizabeth Hartman in A Patch of Blue (Photo: MGM)

By Matt Brunson

A PATCH OF BLUE (1965)
★★★½ (out of four)
DIRECTED BY Guy Green
STARS Sidney Poitier, Elizabeth Hartman

Adapted by writer-director-producer Guy Green from Elizabeth Kata’s novel Be Ready With Bells and Drums, A Patch of Blue is an enormously moving drama featuring a remarkable debut by 21-year-old Elizabeth Hartman.

Hartman stars as Selina, who was accidentally blinded at the age of 5 by her trashy mother (Shelley Winters). Now a young woman and living with her mom and her perpetually drunk grandfather (veteran Wallace Ford in his final film appearance), Selina pines for those moments when she’s allowed outside the apartment for afternoon visits to the park. There, she eventually encounters Gordon Ralfe (Sidney Poitier), a stranger who takes pity on the girl and eventually becomes her close friend. Selina doesn’t realize that Gordon is black, although it wouldn’t matter to her either way; alas, the same viewpoint isn’t shared by her bigoted mother.

Hartman is superb as Selina, delivering an absolutely heartbreaking performance, while Poitier expertly adds additional dimensions to what could have been a slender Good Samaritan role. As for Winters, she delivers the same blowsy performance found in too many of her movies; nevertheless, she won the Academy Award (her second) for Best Supporting Actress. Far more worthy of recognition were those nominated in four other categories: Best Actress (Hartman), Best Original Score (a memorable effort by the great Jerry Goldsmith), Best Black-and-White Cinematography, and Best Black-and-White Art Direction-Set Decoration.

A Patch of Blue was an enormous box office hit, although, as expected, scenes of Poitier and Hartman sharing a kiss had to be removed from prints of the movie shown in the South. Hartman would only appear in a handful of films over the next couple of decades, including Francis Ford Coppola’s 1966 You’re a Big Boy Now, 1982’s animated feature The Secret of NIMH (providing the voice of the lead character, Mrs. Brisby), and, most memorably, opposite Clint Eastwood in 1971’s The Beguiled. Suffering from depression, she tragically committed suicide in 1987, leaping from her fifth-floor apartment window. She was 43.

(A Patch of Blue will be screened as part of VisArt Video’s Black History Month series at 3pm Sunday, February 4, at the venue, located at 3104 Eastway Drive. Admission is free, but donations are appreciated. For more information, head here.)