final run in Utah<\/a>, Sundance organizers chose to return to the film that started it all with a special screening of \u201cDownhill Racer.\u201d<\/p>\nThe uphill battle of \u2018Downhill Racer\u2019<\/h3>\n Although she wished her father was there to present the film that meant so much to him, Amy Redford stood in his place, sharing some of that story with viewers on Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a minute since I\u2019ve seen the movie,\u201d she said after the screening at the Ray Theatre in Park City.<\/p>\n
She praised the film\u2019s artistry \u2014 in particular the shots that were captured by mounting cameras on skis and throwing viewers right into the action. Those techniques were \u201cpretty revolutionary at the time,\u201d she said, helping to create an authentic, documentary-like feel.<\/p>\n\n\nParamount Pictures<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
As Amy Redford tells it, one significant challenge her father faced in creating \u201cDownhill Racer\u201d was that his character \u2014 an ambitious, single-minded skier named David Chappellet who only has his sights on being the best \u2014 was largely unlikable.<\/p>\n
Redford\u2019s character shows his arrogance early on in the film as he refuses to race due to receiving a late starting position. When he finally makes his European skiing debut, he\u2019s still unhappy about his starting position but places fourth. While getting congratulated after that race, he quickly retorts, \u201cMaybe next time I\u2019ll get a higher starting number.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe character is imperfect, and the industry didn\u2019t want to see an imperfect Bob Redford,\u201d she said. \u201cThey wanted to see what they wanted to see.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was always trying to have the freedom to investigate imperfection, humanity,\u201d she added. \u201cBut because people cherished him as the star, there wasn\u2019t a lot of room for that. So I think part of his drive to support writers and filmmakers who were interested in investigating complex characters was so that (filmmakers) beyond him might be able to have the opportunity to do that, still work, still have that freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\n
He was always trying to have the freedom to investigate imperfection, humanity. But because people cherished him as the star, there wasn\u2019t a lot of room for that.<\/p>\n
Amy Redford<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\nThe uphill battle of \u201cDownhill Racer\u201d is a saga festival programmer John Nein said he\u2019s heard Robert Redford recount at the Directors Brunch for more than 20 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a fantastic story. It would change in little ways year to year \u2014 in great ways,\u201c Nein said with a laugh during Friday\u2019s screening. \u201dHe was a great storyteller.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Redford may have changed little details of the story here and there, the fundamental parts remained the same \u2014 enough so that the festival was able to piece together archived footage of Redford sharing his story at various brunches over the years, allowing viewers to hear it in his own words.<\/p>\n\n\nRobert Redford in April 1986. Deseret News Archive | Deseret News Archives<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Robert Redford: \u2018Stay the course. It\u2019s going to be OK\u2019<\/h3>\n In a 3 1\/2- minute montage of clips that showed Redford from 2002 to 2018, the late actor and Sundance founder opened up with filmmakers about the ups and downs of \u201cDownhill Racer.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cJust want to share with you that I have been there and I know what it feels like, and so I\u2019m empathetic \u2014 not just sympathetic,” Redford said. \u201cIt is always tough because of what you, the filmmaker, are putting on the line.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was an actor in the industry, and there was no independent world, and I began to want, and have the urge, to tell my own story, in my own way,\u201d he continued. \u201cTo get that idea I chose skiing because I thought the visual capabilities of skiing had poetry and danger, and that was beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a hard sell for Paramount, so Redford had to use his own resources to bring his vision to life.<\/p>\n
In the Sundance clips, he talked about the scrappiness that went into creating the film. At one point, he went to a sporting goods store from his childhood in Santa Monica, California, and got a motorcycle helmet. He covered it in silver tape and put USA on the front. He cut out his own skiing bib. He and a photographer he hired wore disguises so they could secretly film footage at the 1968 Olympics in Grenoble, France.<\/p>\n
Out of this scrappiness emerged a film that brought Redford joy.<\/p>\n\n\nRobert Redford, founder and president of the Sundance Institute, talks to the media during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival’s annual Day One press conference at the Egyptian Theatre in Park City on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2017. | Kristin Murphy<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\u201cI was very proud of it, the studio was not excited about it,\u201d Redford told filmmakers.<\/p>\n
The actor recalled being \u201cunbelievably nervous\u201d at the first screening of the film.<\/p>\n
As people started realizing it was a movie about skiing, Redford said he heard murmurs throughout a nearby row and people started to leave. Dead silence, and then a sigh came during a scene Redford had thought was pretty funny.<\/p>\n
\u201cPretty soon whole rows were getting up,\u201d he recalled. \u201cAnd I watched that theater empty in front of my eyes, along with my insides.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI wanted to tell that story to share with you that it wasn\u2019t always easy for someone that maybe it looks like it was,\u201d he continued to filmmakers. \u201cStay the course. It\u2019s going to be OK.\u201d<\/p>\n
Near the end of the Sundance footage, Redford offered up encouragement to his fellow filmmakers through a quote from poet T.S. Eliot: \u201c\u2018There\u2019s only the trying, the rest is not our business.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd that\u2019s who we are,\u201d he continued. \u201cSo, God bless.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Each year during the Sundance Film Festival, Robert Redford would briefly escape the city chaos and go into the mountains. At the Sundance Mountain Resort, tucked in the Wasatch Mountains, he would welcome filmmakers from all over to the festival\u2019s Directors Brunch. For Redford, this was a festival highlight \u2014 a chance to connect with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2260590,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[373615,373814,373364,348488,319843,333528,304789,374036],"class_list":["post-2260589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-amy-redford","tag-bob-redford","tag-downhill-racer","tag-independent-film","tag-paramount-pictures","tag-robert-redford","tag-sundance-film-festival","tag-sundance-mountain-resort"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/For-Robert-Redford-this-is-the-movie-that-started-it.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2260589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2260589"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2260589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2260591,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2260589\/revisions\/2260591"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2260590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2260589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2260589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2260589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}