Editing A Patch of Blue (section)

==Reception==
===Critical reception===
The [[New York Times]] was critical: "There is no doubt about the good intentions of those who produced 'A Patch of Blue,'....But for the most part this little drama...seems a compound of specious contrivance. Miss Hartman...is just a wee bit too tidy and sweet...The action is too patly formulated, and Mr. Poitier, who is an honest performer, has to act like a saint. Why should it be, in a film of this nature...that the cold-water flat in which the heroine lives...looks like any phony slum apartment fabricated by the art department of a studio? And why should it be that the tune the girl is humming when the man comes upon her in the park is  'Over the Rainbow?' Why should they leap and frolic like a couple of Disney kids on a shopping spree in a supermarket? And why should she discover a French music box that plays a little tune that he sings, in French, when she first visits his apartment? These are small things, but many more like them, strung together in a get-this-clearly way, give an air of artificial fictionalizing to what should be a casual, gritty, human, throbbing film."<ref>{{cite news|last=Crowther |first=Bosley |title=Moving Story is Spoiled by Sugary Treatment |work=The New York Times |date=16 December 1965 |page=63}}</ref>

The [[Chicago Tribune]] wrote: "That storied shrew, the Wicked Stepmother, is back again. This time she's played by Shelley Winters, who is not actually a step relative...but is wicked enough to make anyone see red....Not woman enough to do a solo set in sadism, Shelley shares her apartment with another Mean Person, a gin-guzzling grandfather....The park is the girl's salvation, for there she meets a young man who opens up a new world to her. As played by Sidney Poitier, he is both kind and practical, never patronizing.....As Selina, newcome Hartman extracts what she can from the mawkish, melodramatic script and effectively captures the personality nuances of the pale, gaunt girl whose frightened-rabbit isolation in the bleak apartment is transformed into a childlike exuberance in the park where a patch of green becomes her patch of blue."<ref>{{cite news|last=Clifford |first=Terry |title=As Film, 'Patch of Blue' Wears Thin. |work=Chicago Tribune |date=31 January 1966 |page=b12}}</ref>

The ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' magazine review was mixed: "'A Patch of Blue' takes some getting used to. It starts as a pointless little tearjerker, then turns abruptly into contemporary hope opera. To save it from itself requires extraordinary skill, and the movie is fortunate in having miracle workers at hand....Luckily, Director Guy Green...has a knack for sustaining the sort of idea that in lesser hands might easily slip from pathos into bathos. Green's style is simple, forceful and true, and he habitually activates a performer's most astonishing inner resources. The prize of his present cast is 21-year-old film fledgling Elizabeth Hartman....Patch of Blue flirts openly with the issue of interracial love, only to leave it unresolved in the last reel, and the film's message becomes almost immaterial. In their quiet, tender scenes together, Hartman and Poitier conquer the insipidity of a plot that reduces tangled human problems to a case of the black leading the blind."<ref>{{cite magazine|title="Cinema" Color-Blind |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |date=17 December 1965}}</ref>

''A Patch of Blue'' has a 89% approval rating on [[Rotten Tomatoes]], based on nine reviews.<ref>{{cite web |title=A Patch of Blue |url=https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/a_patch_of_blue_1965 |website=[[Rotten Tomatoes]] |access-date=22 November 2023}}</ref>

===Box-office===
The film proved to be the most successful in Poitier's career, which proved a lucrative development considering he agreed to a salary cut in exchange for 10% of the film's gross earnings. In addition, the film made Poitier a major national film star with excellent business in even southern cities like Houston, Atlanta and Charlotte.<ref>{{cite book|last=Harris|first=Mark|title=Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of The New Hollywood|url=https://archive.org/details/picturesatrevolu00harr_0|url-access=registration|year=2008|pages=[https://archive.org/details/picturesatrevolu00harr_0/page/159 159]|publisher=Penguin Books|isbn=9781594201523}}</ref>

===Awards and nominations===
{| class="wikitable plainrowheaders"
|-
! Award
! Category
! Nominee(s)
! Result
! Ref.
|-
| rowspan="5"| [[38th Academy Awards|Academy Awards]]
| [[Academy Award for Best Actress|Best Actress]]
| [[Elizabeth Hartman]]
| {{nom}}
| align="center" rowspan="5"| <ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1966 |title=The 38th Academy Awards (1966) Nominees and Winners |access-date=August 24, 2011 |publisher=[[Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150111233714/http://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1966 |archive-date=January 11, 2015 |url-status=live}}</ref>
|-
| [[Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress|Best Supporting Actress]]
| [[Shelley Winters]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[Academy Award for Best Production Design|Best Art Direction – Black-and-White]]
| Art Direction: [[George Davis (art director)|George Davis]] and [[Urie McCleary]]; <br> Set Decoration: [[Henry Grace]] and [[Charles S. Thompson (set decorator)|Charles S. Thompson]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[Academy Award for Best Cinematography|Best Cinematography – Black-and-White]]
| [[Robert Burks]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[Academy Award for Best Original Score|Best Music Score – Substantially Original]]
| [[Jerry Goldsmith]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[20th British Academy Film Awards|British Academy Film Awards]]
| [[BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role|Best Foreign Actor]]
| [[Sidney Poitier]]
| {{nom}}
| align="center"| <ref>{{cite web |url=http://awards.bafta.org/award/1967/film |title=BAFTA Awards: Film in 1967 |publisher=[[British Academy Film Awards]] |year=1966 |access-date=September 16, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140808050903/http://awards.bafta.org/award/1967/film |archive-date=August 8, 2014 |ref={{harvid|BAFTA|1967}}}}</ref>
|-
| rowspan="6"| [[23rd Golden Globe Awards|Golden Globe Awards]]
| colspan="2"| [[Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Drama|Best Motion Picture – Drama]]
| {{nom}}
| align="center" rowspan="6"| <ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.goldenglobes.com/film/patch-blue/ |title=A Patch of Blue |publisher=[[Golden Globe Foundation]] |access-date=July 5, 2021}}</ref>
|-
| [[Golden Globe Award for Best Director|Best Director – Motion Picture]]
| rowspan="2"| [[Guy Green (filmmaker)|Guy Green]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay|Best Screenplay – Motion Picture]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama|Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama]]
| Sidney Poitier
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama|Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama]]
| rowspan="2"| Elizabeth Hartman
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actress|Most Promising Newcomer – Female]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[Kansas City Film Critics Circle|Kansas City Film Critics Circle Awards]]
| Best Supporting Actress
| Shelley Winters
| {{won}}
| align="center"| <ref>{{cite web |url=https://kcfcc.org/kcfcc-award-winners-1966-69/ |title=KCFCC Award Winners – 1966-69 |date=December 14, 2013 |publisher=[[Kansas City Film Critics Circle]] |access-date=July 10, 2021}}</ref>
|-
| rowspan="5"| [[Laurel Awards]]
| colspan="2"| Top Drama
| {{nom}}
| align="center" rowspan="5"| 
|-
| Top Male Dramatic Performance
| Sidney Poitier
| {{won}}
|-
| Top Female Dramatic Performance
| Elizabeth Hartman
| {{nom}}
|-
| Top Male Supporting Performance
| [[Wallace Ford]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| Top Female Supporting Performance
| Shelley Winters
| {{won}}
|-
| [[18th Writers Guild of America Awards|Writers Guild of America Awards]]
| [[Writers Guild of America Award for Best Written Drama|Best Written American Drama]]
| Guy Green
| {{nom}}
| align="center"| <ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.wga.org/awards/awardssub.aspx?id=1551 |title=Awards Winners |publisher=[[Writers Guild of America Awards]] |archive-url=https://archive.today/20121205095022/http://www.wga.org/awards/awardssub.aspx?id=1551 |archive-date=2012-12-05 |access-date=2010-06-06}}</ref>
|}