FILMMAKER Sydney Pollack, 73, who died of cancer at his California home on Monday, carved out a long career in the movie mainstream, as a director, producer and actor.

He started out as a stage actor and drama teacher, before moving into directing for television and then film.

His own appraisal of his talents was modest. He had an interest in making films about social issues, but he had a strong instinct for what would please audiences, and forged plenty of connections with stars, directing the likes of Barbra Streisand, Robert Redford, Meryl Streep and Dustin Hoffman in some of their most successful films.

With Robert Redford, in particular, he had a long working relationship: they made seven films together, including box-office hits such as The Way We Were (not a critical favourite) and Out of Africa (which won Academy Awards for best director and best film in 1982). Both look a little faded now.

Pollack once described Redford as a "perfect kind of alter ego for me to tell certain kinds of love stories". One of their better collaborations was no love story. The taut 1975 thriller Three Days of the Condor was one of a crop of political paranoia films that were a perfect fit for the times. It must have been close to Pollack's heart, because he went to court in Denmark over it in 1997, arguing that a Danish TV station that put to air a cropped version of the widescreen movie was mutilating the film, and threatening his artistic reputation.

His biggest hits were in the 1980s, with Tootsie and Out of Africa: this was also the time when he began to expand into production, often focusing on independent films, most recently through the company he set up with the British filmmaker Anthony Minghella, who died in March.

He had as many acting credits as directing ones, although most of his roles were cameos. They include, however, several memorable appearances, such as a leading role in one of Woody Allen's best films, Husbands and Wives. He often played characters in authority with a dark side and something to hide, whether in other directors' films, such as Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut, or in the recent thriller Michael Clayton, starring George Clooney, which he also produced. Acting, he said, was a reality check for him, and a way of keeping up with what other directors were doing.

His last film as a director revolved around a different kind of star power: it was a documentary, an affectionate portrait of architect Frank Gehry, one of Pollack's friends. He was due to direct another documentary, on the 2000 US election, but illness forced him to confine himself to an executive producer's role.

In 2001, he came to Australia to take part in producers' and directors' conferences, and acted as a presenter at the AFI Awards.