Selina (Elizabeth Hartman) is a blind girl from a very trashy family. Her mother (Shelly Winters) turns tricks and her father (Wallace Ford) is a drunk. As a result of this impoverished environment, Selina hasn't seen much of the outside world and has no idea how to cope with the basics of everyday life. Her parents also didn't bother to give her any education! Not surprisingly, she's starved to experience the outside world and is a very sad young lady. Eventually, she gets a neighbor to take her to a nearby park and leave her there for the day. She loves her new experiences and soon meets a very nice and understanding man, Gordon (Sidney Poitier). They soon become friends and eventually fall in love...which is a serious problem because her trashy family are, among other things, total bigots. Another problem is Gordon's roommate (Ivan Dixon) as he, too, is a bigot. And, finally, she has no idea he's black...nor does she really care.

This is a terrific film but I have one bit of warning....it's very tough watching some of the scenes between Selina and her evil mother. I can see why Winters received an Oscar for her supporting role...she was vile and vicious. Seeing her slapping the blind girl about and screaming at her is tough to watch and you might want to keep some Kleenex handy. The acting, in addition to Winters, is also terrific--and it's a truly amazing film to watch with a lot to say. Well worth seeing and it's nice to see the ugliness of prejudice is in no way mitigated or softened. As a result, it hits you like a ton of bricks and is a great counter-point to the love between the two leads.

Watching this film I was struck at once with how daring it was and how daring it could have been. A Patch Of Blue is dated very much like that other Sidney Poitier movie, Guess Who's Coming To Dinner, a milestone and daring for its time, but old fashioned today. But that was about as much as America could handle back then.

Newcomer Elizabeth Hartman plays the blind and childlike Selena Darcy living with her white trash mother Shelley Winters and alcoholic grandfather Wallace Ford. She's got one miserable existence, living in an apartment she rarely goes out of and stringing beads for necklaces to contribute to the family income. When she decides one day to go to the park for a bit of fresh air, she meets up with Sidney Poitier, an office worker who also likes the park during the day as a change from his night job.

Hartman's been blind since the age of five, the result of Winters throwing a caustic substance at her husband during a fight and hitting the child. That child services never took this kid away at some point is beyond me. Shelley makes an extra buck or two as a hooker besides and she brings her tricks up to the apartment. All in all one miserable excuse for a human being. She's abusive drunk or sober and Wallace Ford is usually drunk.

The innocent relationship that Hartman has with Poitier and it's abundantly clear no sex is involved opens up a whole new world for Hartman. She's not been taught the most rudimentary skills for coping with the world that a blind person would normally get, such as reading Braille.

If this were done today the setting might have been the urban south instead of Los Angeles, some place like Atlanta for instance. And Poitier's lack of sexual enthusiasm would simply be explained with the obvious answer, that his character is gay. But four years from Stonewall that wasn't in the cards.

Still A Patch Of Blue is a fine film about a young woman's reach for freedom and responsibility with the help of a new found friend. Shelley Winters won her second Oscar for Best Supporting Actress to go well on her mantel with that one for The Diary Of Anne Frank. Newcomer Elizabeth Hartman was nominated for Best Actress, but lost ironically to a most amoral Julie Christie in Darling. A Patch Of Blue marked the farewell appearance of Wallace Ford, he died as I well remember while A Patch Of Blue was still playing in theaters.

A daring film for its time with a timeless message, if a remake was done today a lot could and would be changed.

Selina D'Arcey (Elizabeth Hartman) is the long suffering blind daughter of her mean-spirited prostitute mother Rose-Ann (Shelley Winters). When she was five, her father Harry got into a fight with her mother's date. Rose-Ann threw a bottle at Harry but hit Selina instead. They live with her grandpa Ole Pa in a rundown LA apartment. She yearns to spend the day in the park despite her mother's objection. She meets kindly office worker Gordon Ralfe (Sidney Poitier) who teaches the naive uneducated Selina. She doesn't know his color at first. The interracial romance causes friction. Her mother forbids it and his brother hates it. Poitier is playing the super nice black guy in this important movie. The acting is terrific. Winters is at her bombastic best. Hartman is sweet. Poitier is a bit too saintly but he needed to be for this movie to work at that time. That limits the heat in the relationship and that's the only drawback for me.