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Robert Redford, a visionary filmmaker and Hollywood Titan with Golden Boy looks, passed away on Tuesday at 89, leaving behind a legacy woven into American film fabrics. As fans around the world lament, many have returned to the screen to celebrate his career – from his star-making turn as Sundance child in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance child,” the role of Oscar-nominated “Sting,” the portrayal of Bob Woodward in “All Presidential Man,” and his “Everything Lost”
Rather than just a top-notch guy, Redford embodied the unusual crossover between film stars and cultural icons. He changed the landscape of independent filmmaking by bringing political urgency to mainstream cinema in the 1970s and founding Sundance, which later became the launchpad of countless voices outside the studio system.
“In his heyday in his ’70s, few actors own Redford’s star wattage. “His environmental work, his anti-establishment approach to filmmaking and his pioneering efforts to provide platforms for indie filmmakers allowed Redford to use celebrities to destroy the status quo while moving forward with his own creative agenda.”
His Heydey began with a series of films that made him a superstar in the ’70s. Starting with the successful Western “Jeremiah Johnson,” he reunited with Newman and won an Oscar nomination for “The Sting,” the 1973 Best Picture Film Academy selection, becoming the number one box office star for the next three years. Also in 1973 he solidified his role as the romantic lead opposite Barbra Streisand in “The Way We We We We.” Despite the lukewarm reviews, it earned $50 million and strengthened his smoldering reputation.
Below, check out 10 of Redford’s most iconic films over the years.
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
Image credit: ©20thcentfox/courtesy Everett Collection
Summary: A Buddy Western Thriller that made Redford famous and combined with Paul Newman in genre bending classics
Streaming location: Rental/buy with Prime Video
Variety Review: “Action focuses on the pair’s misfortunes in pursuit of the Outlaw Trail, but more importantly, it packs in the type of fast movement the title suggests.”
Sting (1973)
Image credit: Courtesy of Everett Collection
Summary: Stylish con artist Caper reunites Redford and Newman, earning the best picture and showing off his easy charisma.
Streaming location: Rental/buy with Prime Video
Variety Review: “Paul Newman and Robert Redford play George Roy Hill’s outstanding direction, this time as Chicago con artists of the 30s, with both David S. Ward’s great waste and surprise surprise virtues, to fleece the big racketters that Robert Shaw will cast and perform beautifully.
How We Was (1973)
Image credit: Courtesy of Everett Collection
Summary: The cultural stay power sealed by Barbra Streisand’s romantic juggernaut, title ballad.
Streaming (1973): Rental/Buy with Prime Video
Variety Review: “The film version of Arthur Lorenz’s book is a bulging, speaking, redundant, moody melodrama that combines young love, merciless 1930s and 1940s nostalgia.
Jeremiah Johnson (1972)
Image credit: ©Warner Bros/Courtesy Everett Collection
Summary: Redford is a man of the mountain retreating into the wilderness, symbolizing the ruggedness of the new Hollywood of the 1970s.
Streaming location: Tubi
Variety Review: “Robert Redford as Johnson has a great touch to his speech at the time, giving him a self-dy disability talent to comment on his actions at times.”
Three Days of Condor (1975)
Image credit: Courtesy of Everett Collection
Summary: A tense thriller in which past Cold War thrillers have increased Post Watergate’s delusions and Redford’s political advantage.
Where to stream: Prime Video with MGM+
All Presidents’ Men (1976)
Summary: His turn as journalist Bob Woodward in Watergate Expose defined a political thriller and highlighted his activist streak.
Streaming location: Rental/buy with Prime Video
Variety Review: “Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein’s “All Presidents’ Men” approaches the lead roles starring American Z. Robert Redford and especially Dustin Hoffman, about a book about his experiences revealing the Washington Post’s Watergate cover-up. ”
The Natural (1984)
Image credit: Everett Collection (22152)
Summary: Mythical and national baseball story with Redford, Batcrack still as a legendary flawed hero on screen.
Streaming location: Rental/buy with Prime Video
Variety Review: “The Natural” is perfectly made, but it’s a very strange f-talk about its successes and failures in America. Redford is fully cast as a careful and guarded Hobbs.
From Africa (1985)
Image credit: ©MCA/Courtesy Everett Collection
Summary: The romance on the other side of Meryl Streep solidified Redford’s position as a leading man in fame movies.
Streaming location: Rental/buy with Prime Video
Variety Review: “Two and a half hours of “From Africa” certainly starts slowly with that story. But aside from boredom, the photos pick up the pace and become a delicate, enveloping romantic tragedy.
The river passes through it (1992)
Image credit: ©Columbia Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
About: As director, Redford brought lyrical beauty to this Montana family saga, winning an Oscar for the finest cinematography and launching Brad Pitt.
Where to stream: Prime Video with MGM+
Variety Review: “The highly promoted and careful adaptation of the highly promoted story, “The River A Passes Through It,” is a compelling trip back in time to the virtually vanished American West, and is the third directorial exit of Robert Redford, literary and restrained. ”
Everything is lost (2013)
Image credit: ©Lions Gate/Courtesy Everett Collection
Summary: Redford has a seam-less, almost wordless survival story, and proves that his planetary power never faded, Redford is a late-career victory.
Streaming location: Prime Video
Variety Review: “JC Chandor avoids the sophomore slump in a drama in Shea with a striking spare starring the stunning Robert Redford.”
