Dharmendra made a soft landing in Hindi cinema singing Mukesh’s 'Mujhko is raat ki tanhai mein awaaz na do' in Arjun Hingorani's Dil Bhi Tera Hum Bhi Tere (1960), a sad, star-crossed love story about the poor and disempowered in Mumbai, who are unable to rise above their circumstances.
The film also showcased a facet of Dharmendra’s personality that he came to be identified with for the rest of his life—his unquestionable handsomeness. The audience could not take its eyes off the chaste good looks and trim body, the debutante sported as a young street salesman turned boxer. Few years down the line, the screen caught fire, metaphorically, in OP Ralhan's Phool Aur Patthar (1966) when Garam-Dharam, as he later came to be called, loomed over a sleeping Meena Kumari as he protected her from the cold. An iconic moment in the history of Hindi cinema.
At a time when fitness was not quite the characteristic of a Hindi film hero, Dharmendra rang in a new paradigm of robustness. A legacy carried forward by the likes of Vinod Khanna and Salman Khan and practically every single contemporary male star. However, there has been a significant difference: Dharmendra's was not about sculpted, gym-toned, six-pack abs but a rugged, old-school male ideal. His masculinity before getting taken over by the action and stunts and loudness in the 80s was also underlined with a quiet tenderness, overwhelming romance and playful humour. There was a sense of equality and partnership with the women—in early films like Ramesh Saigal's Shola Aur Shabnam (1961), Mohan Kumar's Anpadh (1962), Asit Sen's Mamta (1966)—which, later, turned into a hermetically sealed protectiveness towards them—Ramesh Sippy's Seeta Aur Geeta (1972)—or an amorous chase—Manmohan Desai's Dharam Veer (1977).
It couldn’t take away from his indubitable talent and the fact that he deserved more than he got. He remained impervious to the superstardom of his contemporaries Rajesh Khanna and Amitabh Bachchan but didn’t get celebrated as much for his own. Despite the diversity of roles in over 300 films and sixty-five years in the film industry dotted with innumerable hits, being the He-Man ended up defining Dharmendra and confining him as well. He got mythologized as a macho hero than acknowledged as a versatile actor. He may have started off by being spotted in Filmfare’s nationwide new talent hunt, but awards for individual films eluded him. However, his contribution to Hindi cinema was celebrated later with the Padma Bhushan (2012) and several lifetime achievement awards, including the Filmfare trophy (1997).
For a generation like mine that has grown up on Bachchan and him, choices of the preferred Dharmendra have been many. Superb action entertainers like Raj Khosla's Mera Gaon Mera Desh (1971), Pramod Chakravorty's Jugnu (1973), Nasir Hussain's Yaadon Ki Baaraat (1973), Dulal Guha's Pratiggya (1975), Ramanand Sagar's Charas (1976), or the 33 films in which he starred with Hema Malini to make one the most successful screen couples since Raj Kapoor-Nargis.
The Botany professor posing as a Hindi obsessed chauffeur in Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Chupke Chupke (1975) deserves more glory. As does the range of emotions that he gets to portray—from a funny drunken act to poignant loss of his bestie—in the Ramesh Sippy classic Sholay (1975). Most so the early films marked with a mix of intensity and vulnerability. Characters that were close to reality and performances that were honest and straight from the heart.
One of my earliest memories of him is as the young jail doctor in Bimal Roy’s Bandini (1963) whose deep love for one of his prisoners, played by Nutan, remains sadly unrequited. He was heartbreaking in Chetan Anand's Haqeeqat (1964) as the young captain in charge of a platoon in Ladakh in the Sino-Indian war of 1962 who sacrifices his love for a Ladakhi girl and his own life too at the call of duty. He was charismatic as the empathetic writer that Sharmila Tagore falls in love with as the titular character in Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Anupama (1966) despite the already fraught relationship with her father. His finest act, however, remains in Mukherjee's Satyakam (1969) as an engineer who puts his ideals before his own self, his father and his family.
Through the 80s, 90s and 2000s his career began slipping as he began working in actioners while his own sons and nephew—Sunny, Bobby and Abhay Deol—took to showbiz. He slipped into character roles and later retired to his farmhouse in Lonavala.
It took Sriram Raghavan to celebrate the Garam-Dharam magic and several of his films and performances in the caper Johnny Gaddar (2007). And, ironically, it's Raghavan’s Ikkis, a few weeks away from release, that'd perhaps be his last, and posthumous, performance. From a martyr in Haqeeqat to the father of one in the Raghavan film, hopefully it would be the fitting finale for the multi-layered person and actor that Dharmendra was.