"You've messed up, you know?" Denys Finch Hatton asks Baroness Karen Blixen. "What?" she asks. "Being alone," Denys replies. Out of Africa, has left us a little more alone in this world. At the same time, paradoxically, it has made us feel more accompanied in a condolence that we experience with human proximity and the distance of myth. A coherent, intelligent, elegant, and immensely attractive man has died, who contributed to making the world a little better. He achieved this through his activism for the most independent cinema and for the most necessary environmentalism, but I would say that, above all, he succeeded because, despite not being perfect, like everyone else, he never let us down. He could have done so, because he was human, but he remained whole despite the onslaught of a ruthless industry, the danger of egos, and the wealth he earned. With Robert Redford, as already happened with Paul Newman, a Hollywood dies that young people don't know and that people my age have long regarded with nostalgia. It's a fact of life, as an even older generation would say. Because now, the fact of life is not to die.
So, when the news from the previous day seems insurmountable by the next, when more and more examples of the barbarity surrounding us appear, revisiting how Denys Finch Hatton arrived at the farm in the Ngong Hills, or how journalism could still overthrow a government. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, is medicine for the soul. But not because the past was better or better films were made. Botched jobs have been made all our lives. It's because actors like Robert Redford gave you peace of mind even if they made a lousy mess, because everyone has one on their resume. Fortunately, no one is infallible, although there are those who have the real pretension of being so. This wasn't the case. That's why the feeling that Redford's farewell leaves us with is that, without knowing him, a good person has died, one who gave us many cinematic experiences. unforgettable and who opted for a way of doing things that required an effort and sensitivity that aren't abundant. It's gratifying to acknowledge that, too. Because in this world of psychopaths in power, who are gangsters without filters, who spit at journalists, threatening to endanger their countries, who coerce freedom of expression when it goes against them, who get universities, television networks, and other countries to do their bidding, and who haven't faced each other for ages, it's both encouraging and paradoxical to reconnect with people and figures like Robert Redford. Encouraging because role models give us encouragement. And paradoxical because that feeling comforts us when he has just died. But perhaps this is the meaning of life.
Redford represents the best of the United States, this strange nation where there are extraordinary and lucid people who are part of our European imagination. People who comfort us at a time when their country is once again descending into witch hunts, corruption, and a lack of freedoms so ferociously that it makes everyone else fear the worst. That's why it's important to remember that there are men, like Robert Redford, who have contributed to making our planet a place where we can live and tell all kinds of stories. Even the ones we don't like to hear. So thank you for not even leaving us.
