Ekta Kapoor gives Milan Luthria an ultimatum

Considering every director has done underworld cinema to death - from Mahesh Bhatt to Ram Gopal Varma - and considering Sanjay has played a gangster in so many prominent and inconspicuous films, Luthria is at his wit's end as to how he should approach the age-old theme.

I've been focusing on getting the writing right. It's not easy to make a film that looks at the 1980s era and still manages to tell a powerful story, Luthria told IANS.

Although the director is trying to get the basics right for the project, he is clear about the fact that he will focus on gangsterism in the 1980s.

My film for Ekta will take a penetrating look at gangsterism in the 1980s. I'm quite enamoured by the period, quite taken up by the period and its flamboyance. There was a lot of action and inner life in some of the films during that period. I think the last film that looked at gangsterism from inside was Anurag Basu's 'Gangster - A Love Story'.

He admits the challenge is to give it a fresh look.

Earlier, when I was assisting Mahesh Bhatt, he did some interesting takes on gangsterism like 'Saathi' and 'Sir'. The challenge is to have a fresh take at the whole era. I've to take the whole period into account and yet it can't be a rambling look at the era. It has to have a strong story to tell. It has to be a clutter-breaking gangster film.