Robert Redford’s daughter Amy spoke about the loss of her father for the first time publicly Wednesday, sharing a video to Threads about his life and legacy.
About the death of her father, she said, “My world has fallen into silence.”
She then listed some of his accomplishments, both in film (“The Sting,” “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” and “The Way We Were” are all mentioned) and through the founding of the Sundance Film Festival, which has helped an incalculable number of artists over the years. He was, as she said, “an irreplaceable part of Hollywood history” but to her “he was simply my dad.”
“He always said ‘Ordinary People’ was one of the most important works of his life – it won him the Academy Award for Best Director – but what mattered more to him was the film’s message about family, loss and love. He taught me that movies aren’t just about entertainment, they’re about making people think about touching the softest place in our hearts,” Redford, who’s also a filmmaker, said.
While readying her first film, “The Guitar,” Redford said she wasn’t nervous about how the critics would respond. Instead, she was nervous about what her dad would think. Instead of a blistering critique, he met her with kindness. “All he did was gently pat my shoulder and say, ‘It’s good. This is Amy’s film.’”
“Through his life he taught me that cinema and life both require the same two things – courage and love,” Hart Redford said.
Redford passed away on Tuesday in Utah. He left behind a monumental body of work, not just of the films that he directed and starred in but by the filmmakers he encouraged along the way.
