'Butch Cassidy,' 'The Sting,' 'Out of Africa' and 7 more of Robert Redford's most memorable movies

Matinee idol, intuitive actor, Oscar-winning director, Hollywood disrupter — Robert Redford was a rare combination of them all. Either before or behind the camera on roughly 60 films, Redford made Westerns, period pieces, caper comedies (1972’s “The Hot Rock” was filmed partly in East Meadow) and even Marvel movies. And he returned often to the socially conscious drama — political corruption in “All the President’s Men,” an abusive penal system in “Brubaker,” television chicanery in “Quiz Show.” As a founder of the Sundance Film Festival, he championed little-guy filmmakers with big ideas, helping launch an indie revolution that remapped the Hollywood career path for coming generations.

Here are 10 films that encapsulate Redford’s wide-ranging career.

BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID (1969)

One of Redford’s most iconic roles, and the namesake for his film festival, came in this tragicomic Western from director George Roy Hill. The winning chemistry between Redford, still a relative newcomer, and his older co-star Newman sent the film to No. 1 and set a gold standard for the buddy comedy.

THE CANDIDATE (1972)

Posters of a bubble-gum-blowing Redford suggested a light satire, but audiences instead got a splash of political ice water. Redford plays Bill McKay, a long-shot candidate for a California senate seat whose refreshingly honest campaign grows increasingly safe and cynical. Michael Ritchie directs it like a documentary; the cast includes Peter Boyle and Melvyn Douglas.

THE STING (1973) The “Butch Cassidy” team — Redford, Newman and director Hill — reunited for this Depression-era caper comedy about two con men who set their sights on a mobster (Robert Shaw). It’s the “Ocean’s 11” of its day, in which the wildly elaborate con might cost more than the score, but it’s terrific fun. This was Redford’s only Oscar nomination as an actor.

THE WAY WE WERE (1973)

Look beyond the sentimental theme song and you’ll find one of the best films of the decade, a moving story of two opposites — Redford as a charming WASP and Barbra Streisand as a working-class activist — struggling to keep their love alive. Sydney Pollack directs, beautifully, from Arthur Laurents’ note-perfect screenplay (based on his novel). The song won an Oscar, by the way.

THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR (1975) Redford and Pollack reteamed for this quintessential paranoid thriller. Redford plays a bookish CIA analyst inexplicably marked for death; Faye Dunaway is an innocent woman swept up in his plight. The twisty-turny film perfectly captured its moment, arriving a year after the labyrinthine Watergate scandal climaxed.

ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN (1976)

Redford tackled the real Watergate by playing Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward opposite Dustin Hoffman’s Carl Bernstein. Director Alan J. Pakula trails them as they “follow the money” all the way up to President Richard M. Nixon. It’s still regarded as one of the great journalism dramas of all time.

ORDINARY PEOPLE (1980) For his directorial debut, Redford chose a heavy lift: The story of a family struggling with one son’s death and another’s attempted suicide. Leaning on an eclectic cast — including Donald Sutherland, Mary Tyler Moore, Judd Hirsch and Timothy Hutton — Redford turned the material into an unlikely crowd pleaser and won an Academy Award for his efforts.

OUT OF AFRICA (1985)

Redford got top billing over co-star Meryl Streep, but this is really her movie: She plays a married Danish aristocrat who moves to Africa and falls for a handsome big game-hunter (Redford, still dazzling at 49). Based on Isak Dinesen’s autobiographical novel, the movie earned 11 Oscar nods and won seven,  but Redford got snubbed.

QUIZ SHOW (1994) Redford directs Ralph Fiennes as Charles Van Doren, a prominent New York intellectual whose run of wins on NBC’s popular game show “Twenty-One” ended with the shocking revelation that it was rigged. Based on a real-life scandal in the late 1950s, it’s a poignant look back at a time when Americans believed in the media and expected something from their heroes. Though neither a major hit nor an Oscar winner, “Quiz Show” is a superb film that landed on numerous Top Ten lists and still holds an impressive 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

ALL IS LOST (2013) Filmmaker J.C. Chandor became the toast of Sundance thanks to his debut drama, “Margin Call” (2011), then directed the festival’s founder in this one-man thriller about a sailor in peril. With no dialogue or even a proper name for its hero, the film proved that Redford, then in his late 70s, was still willing to experiment.