Robert Redford names the greatest movie he ever made: “One of the finest films ever”
Having enjoyed a career that spanned more than half a century, during which time he lent his name to a string of classic movies, it almost seems unfair to ask Robert Redford which one of his credits can definitively be called the best he ever made.
After all, even though he only earned one Academy Award nomination for his acting exploits, his pictures constantly hovered around the industry’s most prestigious prizes. Even his feature-length directorial debut Ordinary People, which he didn’t act in, won four Oscars, including ‘Best Picture’ and ‘Best Director’.
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid claimed a record-breaking haul at the Baftas and made the ‘Best Picture’ shortlist, Out of Africa claimed the top prize, and he was also an integral part of many other nominees like All the President’s Men and Quiz Show, not to mention his contributions to a number of Oscar-winning films, a list that stretches beyond The Candidate, The Way We Were, and A River Runs Through It.
Some of his personal favourites didn’t even get a sniff during awards season, with Redford fondly remembering Jeremiah Johnson as one of his finest achievements despite the Academy evidently disagreeing on its merits as a contender. Still, two films stand tallest for the man himself and those who’ve followed his career, and it probably goes without saying both of them also star Paul Newman.
They only made a pair of pictures together, but when they’re of the quality of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Sting, it makes perfect sense their careers were permanently interwoven. They’re two seminal features in completely different genres helmed by the same director but equally and spectacularly successful.
Combined, George Roy Hill’s gun-toting western and con artist caper earned over $350million at the box office and won 11 Oscars from 17 nominations, which is a hell of a return. Redford is fully aware they’re two defining movies from a legendary run on either side of the camera, so it wouldn’t be out of the question to think trying to choose between them would be like picking a favourite child.
And yet, he made his choice. “I enjoyed making both of them,” he opined to The Telegraph. “But if I were to step back and be truly objective, I would say, as much as I love Butch Cassidy, I think The Sting is one of the finest films ever, and that belongs to George Roy Hill. He’s the guy who designed it, who came up with the music and did everything.”
A typically modest appraisal, considering Redford notched his solitary acting Oscar nod for his performance as Johnny Hooker opposite Newman’s Henry Gondorff, albeit a pretty definitive assessment on which of his films he’ll always remember as being the cream of the crop.
