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Duds in the department

Let us not mince words. Department could have been a saving grace for Ram Gopal Varma. But he's going down and taking the movie with him. When it becomes hard to survive the movie experience itself, we can only tell you how tough it is to review.

The actors seem to be mouthing lines they despise, the dialogue is contrived, the scenes are painful to the story trajectory and the camera is headache inducing. The histrionics have been wasted and how! The only saving grace for the film is the music.   

The story is a crazy camera ride into the Mumbai underworld that starts from the Department — a special encounter squad made by the Mumbai Police and headed by Inspector Mahadev Bhosle (Sanjay Dutt) — to wipe out the mess. Shivnarayan (Rana Daggubati) is called in to join the men and almost becomes the 'brother from another mother' with Mahadev overnight. And thus begins the joyride where several bullets are pumped into people, some crazy action sequences (one that includes terrorist type hitmen holding kids hostage in a blind school and who run around with bags, much inspired by Ajmal Kasab?), gangs plotting against each other and politicians having their share of the blood pie.  

In all fairness the plot is not half bad – it could have been a very slick, dark movie. But after inane flops, Bollywood should stop making space for RGV's films. The director single-handedly screws it all up. Intertwined tighter than a pretzel, the matter where the civil services, politics and crime work in tandem with each other could have been handled more along the Sarkar lines. But the director lost the plot the moment the camera tries to caress the curves and the pouts, and makes it a very uncomfortable experience. Danny Boyle would kill himself several times over if RGV says that he is indebted to the master for the camera work (only Anurag Kashyap managed it right in
Dev D
).  

Sarjerao Gaikwad (Amitabh Bachchan) is a shadow of Subhash Nagre from Sarkar. The gangster-turned-politician is neither impressive nor convincing. Everyone in the movie seems to have been doing the poor director a favour. Daggubati was better in Dum Maro Dum and Dutt seems to be wanting to hide his face behind his ugly caps. As a corrupt cop, he is as quashed as his role is. Even Abhimanyu Singh has been wasted.  

If you are going to watch the movie for Nathalia Kaur — don't. Watch the song on Youtube if your desire for the oomph factor is that low. Her moves are just in plain bad taste, as are her clothes. The only mercy is that she attacks your senses for only one song. Do NOT go for this movie.
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