There was a heroine, Sadhana, who made a Sadhana cut (a hairstyle) fashionable during her heyday. But there icons of style who had a lot of following. Two of my favourites are/were Rajnikant and Dev Anand. To a lesser extent, Shatrughan Sinha in his early films too.
It is difficult to define, but easy to see style. There is no one thing that defines it. For example, Madhubala's crooked smile could be defined as stylish. Raaj Kumar and Shatrughan had dialogue delivery in style as their forte. But back to Rajni and Dev Anand. When Rajnikant is on the screen, it's hard to focus on anything else. The heroine, other actors, seem almost superfluous. He has a magnetic on-screen presence, and everything -his mannerisms- become imbued with that word- style. Many heroes do exactly what he does on screen, but without that magic ingredient.
I think it's the same with Dev Anand. Even the most mundane scene, he could enliven by the way he said his dialogues, or a smile, or a way of walking- crouched, many times. Regardless of what it was, he managed to be the focus of attention as far as his audience was concerned, at least until the eighties.
Just doffing my hat to two of my favourites, for giving us many hours of pleasure.
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