Schrader's last directorial venture 'Adam Resurrected' featuring Jeff Goldblum and Willem Dafoe was a critical and commercial success.

'Extreme City' will be shot largely in Mumbai and Schrader will soon finalise his script for the film.

'Paul has started work on the script. It'll be an English-language film. But the Indian characters will speak their natural language. The Mumbai underworld is familiar to Hindi film-goers but not to a global audience,' said Sinha.

Talking about foreign filmmakers new-found interest in Mumbai, Sinha said: 'It started when Mira Nair announced 'Shantaram'. Now 'Slumdog Millionaire' has patented Mumbai across the Mumbai. 'Extreme City' will talk about the mafia in detail. We've seen the Sicillian and Brazilian mafia in Hollywood. But not the Mumbai underworld.'

Schrader, in fact, visited Dharavi with Sinha's assistant during his last visit.

'The film will have a swarm of characters. It will star one leading Hollywood and one Bollywood male star,' said Sinha.

'I started my collaboration with Paul Schrader as a fan. In fact, the paper on which he wrote the plot outline, I asked him to sign so I could keep as memento. We're now collaborators,' Sinha gushed.

(Subhash K. Jha can be contacted at jhasubh@gmail.com)