If you’d thought ‘Phoonk’ and ‘Aag’ were the worst of films to have come out of the Ram Gopal Varma camp, it’s time you rethought about it. ‘Department’ takes the ridiculous story-telling skills of the filmmaker a notch above his previous ones. Or below, for that matter. ‘Department’ as a movie overflows with good actors-only to see them waste their acting skills on a B-grade script. Ram Gopal Varma’s tight close-ups and too-detailed scenes of violence are all an assault on the eyes and leave the viewer nauseous by the end of the film. Rana Daggubati as the gun-wielding, remorseless renegade policeman, who seems to have a knack for shooting unarmed people, is an unadulterated waste of talent. That’s it, nothing more for the actor who so charmed us with his act in ‘Dum Maaro Dum’. Cut to Sanjay Dutt. Dutt is given the gift of a licence to kill as far as the underworld is concerned, and is ordered to round up the toughest and fiercest of all cops for the task – and hence ‘The Department’ comes into being. And once it has been engendered, the film walks, jogs, runs and flies into territories which are-simply put-absurd. Big B’s talent too, is brutally wasted in the film. Ram Gopal Varma’s numerous cameras rob him of his acting skills and focus on his cup of tea or semi-sucked kulfi – to a level that is nothing short of ridiculous. Abhimanyu Singh and Deepak Tijori are actors put into the film only to add to its pool of wasted skills. Singh’s awful clothes might have set a trend in fashion elsewhere, but he just isn’t a fashionoclast. Watch ‘Department’ if you have been missing your headaches for a long time. Ratings: One poor cheer for this wastage of time!
