We’re going to be taking a break from news today to spend a little time with the two extremely notable arts recipients of this year’s Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Let’s start by watching the most famous slap in movie history.

And here is Sidney Poitier uttering the most famous line of his career, from the same movie. In context, the impact of that line and what precedes isn’t too different from a slap in the face. Also, check out Poitier’s expression during the pauses. This is some interesting movie acting.

It’s both a cliche and entirely true to say that what Barack Obama is to electoral politics and Jackie Robinson was to sports, Sidney Poitier was to mainstream movies by 1967. He had already been the first African-American to win a Best Actor Oscar in 1963 (Denzel Washington was next, 38 years later), but ’67 was the year of the early not-quite buddy cop trendsetter “In the Heat of the Night, just for starters. Lulu serenaded him in “To Sir, with Love,” he played opposite the greatest screen couple in Hollywood history in “Guess Whose Coming to Dinner?,” and his character married their onscreen daughter in the bargain — a far bigger deal than most people under 30 or so can probably imagine. Both “Night” and “Dinner” were nominated for Best Picture Oscars, and the former actually won. Five years on, he’d become a director, ironically mostly of comedies; naturally, he was one of the very first African-Americans to direct a major Hollywood motion picture as well.

There has been some criticism. The truth is that Hollywood, shy of controversy and needing to make  obvious amends for a long history of blatant onscreen racism, was bending over backward to make sure that Poitier’s characters would be the subject of the audience’s respect. It was, I think, an inevitable step.

The important thing was that Poitier was more than up to the challenge. His characters might have been more upright than the average Joe, but they reflected a very real tradition of excellence within an African-American community aware that success in any field required that blacks be at least three times as disciplined and skilled as whites. More important, Poitier was simply a talented enough and hard working enough actor to humanize his paragons, to make them likable and relatable as well as respectable. His characters might have been unbelievably virtuous at times, but they were never dull.

Here is Poitier in his most critiqued role, with Spencer Tracey. Producer-director Stanley Kramer — a sort of walking symbol of much that was both right and wrong with Hollywood liberalism — was criticized for liberal naivete even at the time (this trailer might give you a clue why), and it’s hard to imagine modern audiences cottoning to the spectacle of two outspokenly anti-racist parents agonizing for the length of the film whether or not to permit their daughter’s marriage to a borderline-saintly handsome young, Ivy-league doctor. But those were different times and even relatively young people sometimes had a hard time recognizing just how rapidly things were changing.

But, forget all that. Just watch Poitier playing this nearly perfect guy. Note the wry humor and the easy rapport he shares with Tracey. Onscreen rapport between any two actors takes work. Playing paragons of virtue that the audience actually likes is next to impossible.