Department Fails To Impress Over Box Office

Given RGV’s track record, especially after COMPANY (barring a SARKAR), his latest venture, the Big B, Sanjay Dutt and Rana Daggubati starrer, DEPARTMENT, was never expected to embark upon a great start. But the 15-25 percent opening (better in Maharashtra, South and single screens of UP & Bihar) was quite disappointing.

A section of the audience and media feels that DEPARTMENT was touted as a Amitabh-Dutt face-off, but quite contrary to expectations, it’s Rana Daggubati who has the most prominent role followed by Sanjay Dutt, with Big B being relegated to a glorious extra. And that will take its toll on the box-office outcome of the film, unless and until it shows a remarkable pick up.

Meanwhile after a good weekend, last Friday’s ISHAQZAADE saw falling collections (though not alarmingly) during the weekdays. The opening week saw the Arjun-Parineeti starrer netting 25 crore (to be validated). The 20-21 crore film from the YRF stable will have to show good legs in the second week to be termed a clean hit, and not just a highly profitable venture. What works in favour of ISHAQZAADE is that 60 percent of its investment has already been recovered by the makers who are also its worldwide distributors.

The other release of the same week, the Vikram Bhatt directed Karisma starrer, DANGEROUS ISHHQ, barely netted 7 crore (to be validated) during the first week and is a debacle.  Source