At Robert Redford founded Sundance Institute, independence was a virtue, not a liability
“Be careful of success; it has a dark side.” So had said Oscar-winning actor-director Robert Redford, who passed away at 89 last week in Provo, Utah. The good-looking, talented actor and sensitive director, who reshaped both Hollywood and the independent film movement, had nailed it through the above quote, pointing out the moral degradation faced by an individual while achieving success, as well as the personal consequences the individual has to suffer in the process.
Redford, whose over five-decade career started at the beginning of the 1960s, like many of his contemporary actors, initially acted in television serials. His big break on the silver screen came when the late acting legend, Paul Newman, handpicked him to be his co-star in the 1969 film, ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’. Although they appeared in just two films together—the multi-Oscar-winning ‘The Sting’ (1974) was the other—Redford and Newman had an iconic friendship bolstered by their love of cars and pranks.
Primarily known for his ‘chocolate boy look’, Redford rose to fame with films like ‘The Candidate’ (1972), ‘Three Days of the Condor’ (1975) and ‘All the President’s Men’ (1976). In ‘All the…’, he enacted the role of Bob Woodward, ‘The Washington Post’ journalist who exposed the Watergate scandal that brought down the presidency of Richard Nixon. Woodward, paying tributes to Redford, said he was “a noble and principled force for good”. In fact, many people remembered the human side of this ‘dazzling’ film star, who was kind and wise and lived a dignified life. One of the homages described him as “a dolphin among sharks”.
In his directorial debut, Redford won the 1980 Academy Award for Best Director for his film, ‘Ordinary People’. He then continued producing/directing quality films like ‘Quiz Show’ (1994), ‘The Horse Whisperer’ (1998) and ‘Lions for Lambs’ (2007) on one hand, while acting in movies like ‘The Electric Horseman’ (1979), ‘Out of Africa’ (1985), ‘Indecent Proposal’ (1993), ‘Spy Game’ (2001), ‘A Walk in the Woods’ (2015) and many more on the other. He was a 2002 Academy Honorary Award recipient and was also awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 74th Venice Film Festival in 2017. The honours continued to pour in.
At one point in time, Redford was disillusioned with the Hollywood mainstream. He knew that good stories weren’t getting made into films because of the rigidity of show business. He therefore founded Sundance Institute and the Sundance Film Festival as an alternative avenue for emerging filmmakers, where independence was a virtue, not a liability. Over the past four decades, the institute and the festival have given an early platform to countless young filmmakers, from Steven Soderbergh to Quentin Tarantino, from Ryan Coogler to Rian Johnson, and many more.
After playing a bank robber in a drama film, ‘The Old Man & the Gun’ (2018), Redford announced his retirement from acting. The actor with the wavy blond hair and boyish grin finally left Superficial L.A. for a peaceful life in Utah, where he became deeply involved in the environmental activism movement.
The passing away of this ‘golden boy’ with the Midas touch saw another iconic Hollywood personality enter the annals of history. His co-stars, from Meryl Streep to Barbra Streisand, filmmakers, from Martin Scorsese to Ron Howard, and politicians, from Donald Trump to Barack Obama, all paid rich tributes to his life and times. Today, actors with an American look, such as Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio, continue to carry forward the legacy of Redford. And this is a positive sign for the world of entertainment.
