Robert redford quotes

Success is a tricky mistress. It's nice to have but it's a tricky thing to embrace.

The important thing about a sport is the people who devote their lives to it.

We program the festival, after 20 years, exactly the way we did on the first day.

The tough thing about adulthood is it starts before you even know it starts.

I used to feel competitive about a career, but now the only things I'm really passionate about are my family, the environment and Indians.

Hollywood was not a place I dreamed of getting to. I never could take seriously the obsession people have about being a celebrity or getting to Hollywood - I was born next door.

I have faith in the pendulum swinging. Right now it's so far against the wall that it can't go any farther; it's gonna start to swing back. That's my optimism. One of the cures is gonna be getting the American people to fully wake up. All the American people, particularly young people, because they're gonna inherit this earth; they're gonna inherit what we're doing.

Have a strong vision about the story you want to tell and how you want to tell it.

The technology available for film-making now is incredible, but I am a big believer that it's all in the story.

I have the freedom to take chances, to say no. I have the freedom to be who I really want to be, rather than have to conform to this or that just to stay alive.

All my life I've been dogged by guilt because I feel there is this difference between the way I look and the way I feel inside.

Now is not the time to repudiate environmental balance, but rather it is the time for all of us to work together - politician, advocate, rancher, scientist, and citizen. Only by doing this will the United States move forward and be a leader in environmental issues and ensure sustainability to our delicate ecosystem.

Storytelling is important. Part of human continuity.

People have been so busy relating to how I look, it's a miracle I didn't become a self-conscious blob of protoplasm.

Other people have analysis. I have Utah.

I'm interested in that thing that happens where there's a breaking point for some people and not for others. You go through such hardship, things that are almost impossibly difficult, and there's no sign that it's going to get any better, and that's the point when people quit. But some don't.

Sundance started with two acres back in 1963 that I bought from a sheepherder for $500. What has happened, I could see development starting to descend on the state of Utah. I thought I had better acquire more land to protect it. I thought that would probably be my legacy, to protect land.

When I was a kid, nobody told me I was good-looking. I wish they had. I would've had a better time.

Between 18 and 19 years old [in the 1950s] I came to Paris. I studied art. And that experience really did change my life. I was living hand to mouth. I walked everywhere. I thought, this city is incredible but you really have to experience it by walking it.

If you want to slice into America, it's pretty red, white, and blue in terms of how it goes about things, but there's a gray area there, and I've always been interested in where things are complicated.

When I grew up, shame was used as a tool for check and balance. If you stood a chance of hearing someone say, "Shame on you," or "You should be ashamed of yourself," you thought twice. It doesn't seem to be a factor today.

You should prepare when you go to a public event to be public. That's when I will sign autographs. But not when you're going about your normal business.

I guess some mistakes you never stop paying for.

If you can do more, you should.

Sundance was started as a mechanism for the discovery of new voices and new talent.

It's a creative enterprise, just like art, just like painting, music. Creating something can be done in different categories, so to do it in film is just another expression, which is great. Because it translates so well because so many people see the work, if you're lucky.

I try to avoid giving advice. The only advice I will give is to pay attention. I don't mean to the screen in your hand. I'm talking about the natural world. I spent a lot of time educating my children about nature by putting them in nature. I said, "I want you to listen; I want you to look." There's so much technology coming into our lives that takes us away from the natural stuff, so I'm pushing the other way.

I don't think about when it's going to stop and what you do before it stops. You just keep moving.

Be careful of success; it has a dark side.

Storytellers broaden our minds: engage, provoke, inspire, and ultimately, connect us.

Whenever there's chaos, there's ambiguity, and where there's ambiguity, there's fear. And fear gets manipulated.

What is it with you people? You think not getting caught in a lie is the same thing as telling the truth?

I don't remember spending any time with anybody on set. I don't spend a lot of time with people.

Criticism challenges current findings. The effort to defend one's position can lead to deeper insights or consideration of options previously not considered.

He's meant to be that classic Homer, Ulysses, Hercules - a character who goes out or has some gift of some kind. He goes on a journey of discovery and part of that is falling into darkness - the temptations of life.

I can't think of anything outside of having the gift yourself and creating yourself. I can't think of the next better thing to do than being able to put it back. Creative expression, I think, is vital to the success of any society.... A society without art will die.

Never revisit the past, that's dangerous. You know, move on.

The meter is ticking [particularly in the face of climate change], so you've got to get to as much as you can as fast as you can. I grew up with 'This Land Is Our Land,' and public land doesn't belong to that administration or this one. We want our kids to grow up with real natural places, not just photos of them.

I've been able to carve out spaces for myself. At Sundance, I'm in the mountains - my property is private. I get on a horse and ride for three, four hours. Sometimes five. I get lost. But when I'm in, I'm in.

The measure of our success will be the condition on which we leave the world for the next generation.

I remember my dad came from Ireland and Scotland, and so he carried with him the fear of poverty. So when I wanted to break loose, it kind of made him very nervous.

I was blessed to look well and retain a youthful look but that was just genes. I was disappointed when critics started pointing out my wrinkles. I thought, you mean this is what it's gonna be about now? I'm not going to be permitted to be human?

I believe in mythology. I guess I share Joseph Campbell's notion that a culture or society without mythology would die, and we're close to that.

When did Noah build the boat? - Before the rain.

I did not, like my children and people today, grow up with television as part of my life.

I have a very low regard for cynics. I think it's the beginning of dying.

I started as an actor in the theater playing a lot of character parts, and suddenly, I found myself in this place where it felt like I was getting locked into a kind of a stereotype, and it did bother me.

I never had to worry about divestment because I never invested.

I'm not interested in a film about golf but I am interested in golf as a metaphor.

I would see my hometown, Los Angeles, change. Green space and orange groves gave way to cement, freeways flooded with traffic, and air pollution, all in the name of "progress." I felt like I was losing my home. It had a profound effect on me, and I realized just how important nature was to my spirit, my soul, my point of view.

Lastly get emotionally connected to your story so you can deliver it, you know, if you can't deliver the emotions to your script there's no point to your story. Story is the key.

Utah is changing. There are good people in Utah. More people want to change the discriminatory laws than want to keep them. People should be able to marry whomever they love.

I think independent filmmakers, documentary filmmakers - they are journalists.

I'd been influenced by reading books on art and colonies that existed in Paris and places like that and so when I came to Europe I came to France and I had very little money, and I had to live low and stayed in a bohemian section of Paris with a lot of other students, who were from medical school, science school and art school. We all lived in a kind of communal way and I was challenged politically, because I didn't have a clue and they would ask me questions about the Algerian War, which was very big in France in the late '50s.

It's an honor putting art above politics. Politics can be seductive in terms of things reductive to the soul.

I was never a good student. I had to be dragged into kindergarten. It was hard to sit and listen to somebody talk. I wanted to be out, educated by experience and adventure, and I didn't know how to express that.

I'm gonna die but I haven't thought about retiring.

The world around us is in a sea change, and I think the glory of art is that it cannot only survive change, it can lead it

I didn’t want the attacks to affect me. I don’t believe you should be led by fear.

Curiously, directing my own films have made me more tolerant and patient. I've always been an extremely impatient actor. Waiting around drove me nuts. But now I'm much more sympathetic to a director's struggle.

As an artist I just can't think of a better life than the one I've been blessed with. It's just a great ride.

We've poisoned the air, the water, and the land. In our passion to control nature, things have gone out of control. Progress from now on has to mean something different. We're running out of resources and we are running out of time.

I guess there are different ways to handle success. You can multiply it financially and use it to multiply your net worth. That's always been very appealing to me.

When I started, I was an artist; I wanted to be an artist. I became an actor almost by accident. I acted for fifteen years and tried to produce. I looked for stories that were the story beneath the story that you thought you knew, like 'The Candidate'.

I think "quiet" sometime is a greater power than noise. It can harbor and reveal feelings that can't be expressed.

Politics right now is in a very dark place, and I think the only place for me is to do what I do - make films, create art, watch it as it evolves. Right now it's like Humpty Dumpty sitting on a wall, and a great fall is happening. The behavior seems to be really dumb.

Filmgoers are starved for new ideas, voices and visions.

In fact you've got your hands tied behind your back when somebody chooses to take a low road in to you, there is nothing you can do about it, and so you just live with it and move on.

The way you really find out about the performer's seriousness about the cause is how long they stay with it when the spotlight gets turned off. You see a lot of celebrities switch gears. They go from the environment to animal rights to obesity or whatever. That I don't have a lot of respect for.

For me, personally, skiing holds everything. I used to race cars, but skiing is a step beyond that. It removes the machinery and puts you one step closer to the elements. And it's a complete physical expression of freedom.

I'm not much interested in sport just as sport. I wouldn't be interested in making a golf film or baseball or fishing film.

'Butch Cassidy' was the only film I ever enjoyed making.

What I would do is when I was younger I would draw in a sketch book something that happened in my life and then write a little something on the side about what happened or what the story.

I think Hollywood... well, there is no Hollywood anymore so let's just call it the mainstream since the business is no longer Hollywood producing its own films and then distributing, they just distribute.

The country is so wounded, bleeding, and hurt right now. The country needs to be healed-it's not going to be healed from the top, politically. How are we going to heal? Art is the healing force.

What really matters is the work. And what matters to me is doing the work. I'm not looking at the back end: "What am I going to get out of this? What's going to be the reward?" I'm just looking at the work, the pleasure of being able to do the work. And that's what the fun is: To climb up the mountain is the fun, not standing at the top. There's nowhere to go. But climbing up, that struggle, that to me is where the fun is. That to me is the thrill. But once that's over, that's kind of it. I don't look too much beyond that.

I don't see myself as beautiful. I was a kid who was freckle-faced, and they used to call me 'hay head.'

Radio, newspapers, they were normal parts of my life. In those days, you had to go somewhere to watch television and leave something to see it.

When I became successful, I put up a caution. I didn't think it was fair to have the shadow of that kind of success thrown on my family. And I was cautious about being taken by things that could destroy you.

San Franciscans are very proud of their city, and they should be. It’s the most beautiful place in the world.

The big moment for me was making 'All the President's Men'. It was not about Watergate or President Nixon. I wanted to focus on something I thought not many people knew about: How do journalists get the story?

Part of me is drawn to the nature of sadness because I think life is sad, and sadness is not something that should be avoided or denied. It's a fact of life, like contradictions are.

I have no regrets, because I've done everything I could to the best of my ability.

That's another thing that's depressing: certain attitudes in Congress. They assume that you're dumb; they can take advantage of you being dumb. I find that offensive. It insults our intelligence. They're playing us for dumb and they're being dumb in doing it. But I believe that's gonna change. I think those people, the McConnells, are not helping us at all. They're taking us backward in time.

There's a lot of hyperventilation that takes off before the [Sundance Film] Festival, a lot of buzz. Every year we hear, this is going to be the new this, this is going to be the new that, and it never is. The buzz just doesn't mean anything. I'm glad it doesn't. Because I think the festival shows that what succeeds is content.

The art of making a film and its content are far more interesting to me than the result or impact.

I think the environment should be put in the category of our national security. Defense of our resources is just as important as defense abroad. Otherwise what is there to defend?

I think there was something that made us not pay attention to climate change. Something that was up there. There was a saying when we were trying to pay attention to the environment that people used this phrase NIMBY - not in my back yard. People were saying, ‘I don’t care, it is not in my back yard.’ But now it’s in everyone’s back yard.

I learned early that you'd better know what you're talking about. You'd better realize that certain issues are going to be so hot - no matter what reason, what logic you apply to it - you're going to be met with an opposition just because their viewpoint is different, and there's no way they're going to accept your reasoning. Furthermore, they're going to attack you because you will be portrayed as not being credible: "You're an actor. What do you know?"

If we want energy security, then we have to reduce our appetite for fossil fuels. There's no other way. Other issues may crowd the headlines, but this is our fundamental challenge. Big challenges require bold action and leadership. To get the United States off fossil fuels in this uneasy national climate of terrorism and conflict in the Persian Gulf, we must treat the issue with the urgence and persistance it deserves. The measure of our success will be the condition on which we leave the world for the next generation.

If you could ever do a project that really has magic in it, and justifiable magic, you should do it.

I don't know what your childhood was like, but we didn't have much money. We'd go to a movie on a Saturday night, then on Wednesday night my parents would walk us over to the library. It was such a big deal, to go in and get my own book.

When I was young, I said to myself, "You've got to make the most of your life." It's all about taking risks. Push yourself to do as much exploration as possible. Find yourself. Because sometimes we think we've found ourselves, but it's only part of ourselves we've found. We haven't pushed ourselves far out there where we make mistakes and things don't work out, but at least we've discovered something. I felt that's what my life had to be.

Golf has become so manicured, so perfect. The greens, the fairways. I don't like golf carts. I like walking. Some clubs won't let you in unless you have a caddy and a cart.

Not taking a risk is a risk. That's how I see it.

We've lost our moral foundation, which allows us to go this far over. So I don't blame Trump. I just think he is what he is. We're the ones who let that happen. We should be looking at ourselves.

A lot of what acting is is paying attention.

I think you just keep going. I've been that way, my whole life.

I'm not a facelift person. I am what I am.

In fact, I think more broadly about what an audience requires, but I want an audience to be fascinated by the process of finding an answer, or finding out there isn't one.

I was producing things I was acting in, but I had never directed and I felt it was time. I was looking for a piece of material that was about behavior and feelings. When I read Judith Guest's book, I thought, This is it.

I am a cynical optimist. Big opening weekends are like cotton candy. The films you will remember over time are the films that stick in the consciousness of the audience in a good way.

What we are living with is the result of human choices and it can be changed by making better, wiser choices.

I had just arrived in New York from California. I was nineteen years old and excited beyond belief. I was an art student and an acting student and behaved as most young actors did - meaning that there was no such thing as a good actor, 'cause you yourself hadn't shown up yet.

Sometimes the failures can be exciting and fun. It's just a step on the road, it's not the end of something.

I've been very fortunate in that I've had wonderful relationships with people I've worked with.

You’re never going to be the same person you are right now.

As a director, I wouldn't like me as an actor. As an actor, I wouldn't like me as a director.

The way I deal with arthritis is to keep moving. As long as I can play hard tennis, as long as I can ski or ride a horse - all kinds of things can come your way. As long as you can, do it. People who retire die. My dad retired and died shortly after. Just keep moving.

It seems everyone in Hollywood is getting pinched, lifted and pulled. I'm looking weird because I'm not.

Times change; Hollywood is not the same as it was when I first entered the business. It felt to me like it was starting to narrow down and centralize itself around what would... make money.

Problems can become opportunities when the right people come together.

It's all about greed and money and it's the driving force in Hollywood.

People are becoming more and more aware of how the dominance of development and business is altering their lives and, in particular, their own heritage.

I was raised in California during the Second World War and into the '50s and everything was fine, everything was great. The sun always shone, everybody looked healthy and wore ties and smoked in restaurants, and there were cars for everybody - except us, because I came from a lower class neighbourhood. But [in France] I realised there was a different point of view, so when I came back to America a year and a half later I was much more focused on my own country culturally and politically.

I am passionate. I am political about my country, about what it is, how strong it is, how strong it remains.

Health food may be good for the conscience but Oreos taste a hell of a lot better.

Television tells us only the things it wants to. It still feeds us heroes, it still offers villains. And even though we know better than to always trust it, we still watch.

...if our humanity - our soul as a society - is overtaken by the materiel and cosmetic, there will be no hope of peace.

I'm not good at compromise.

Journalism has changed tremendously because of the democratization of information. Anybody can put something up on the Internet. It's harder and harder to find what the truth is.

I was seen in earlier years by family members and people of authority as somebody wasting his time. I had trouble with the restrictions of conformity. It made me edgy.

All of the films that I've made are about the country I live in and grew up in... And I think if you're going to put an artist's eye to it, you're going to put a critical eye to it. I've always been interested in the gray area that exists between the black and white, or the red and blue, and that's where complexity lies.

He has the attention span of a lightning bolt.

There's a lot of money to be made by strip-mining and drilling the dirtiest oil on the planet. But why should the rest of us pay the price?