Maula Jatt became a cultural phenomenon, especially Adeeb’s dialogue and the actors’ performances and Mustafa Qureshi’s menacing but honourable bad guy, Noori Natt.

Lashari, 38, who is the writer, director, cameraman and editor of The Legend of Maula Jatt, doesn’t have a memory of watching the original while he was growing up but, like most people of his generation in Pakistan, has lived with it all his life.

“It’s deeply embedded in our popular culture. You hear the film’s dialogues at some dhaba, on TV, see graffiti somewhere, and politicians are often throwing those one-liners at each other,” he said.

Adeeb recalls former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto using Noori Natt’s famous line: “Nawa aaya hai, Soneya [You must be new here, darling],” during a campaign rally, and her husband and former President Asif Ali Zardari saying, “Maulay nu Maula na maray tay Maula nai marda [Unless Maula kills Maula, Maula can’t die],” in response to a question about whether he faced any threats.

‘Goosebumps’

Lashari, whose 2013 debut film, Waar (The Strike), became the highest-grossing film in Pakistan at the time, says he took everything that made the original Maula Jatt a cult film and gave it a “hard reboot”.

He knew the kind of film he wanted to make, who would star and where it would be set – in an unknown time in a fantasy world he calls “Parallel Punjab”.

He dispensed with antiquated concepts like men settling feuds by marrying off their sisters, fleshed out archetypes by giving them compelling backstories, and amped up the Maula Jatt-Noori Natt enmity. He made detailed sketches of characters and scenes and rewrote the screenplay 80 times.

Casting superstar and subcontinental heartthrob Fawad Khan as Maula Jatt was a goosebump-inducing move, as was casting Mahira Khan as the female lead.

“Everyone has seen that side of Fawad … the chocolate hero, the pretty boy side. But I knew that there’s something inside, you can say, controlled aggression. And in the new world, the concept of alpha isn’t necessarily beastly,” Lashari said.

News that Khan would face off with Hamza Ali Abbasi’s Noori Natt added to the pre-release excitement.

And the film arguably draws most of its power from the Natts.

The Legend of Maula Jatt has a distinct aesthetic, the story unfolding in episodes, each introducing a character while moving the plot forward. As the film progresses, the plot thickens, the action intensifies, and tension rises.

“It is very Tarantino-ish, yet very Sergio Leone-ish. There’s a very Spaghetti Western feel to it,” Fawad Khan told Al Jazeera over a Zoom call.

Lashari’s rich, detailed imagination and meticulous execution give The Legend of Maula Jatt the heft of a blockbuster, but creating a fantasy on this scale was not easy in a country that doesn’t have world-class studios.

An action team had to be flown in from the UK to train actors and choreograph fight sequences. There were collaborations with technicians and VFX artists from several countries. A huge set was created in the village of Bedian, on the outskirts of Lahore.

Most Punjabi films swear by patriarchy where women are relegated to playing hapless victims, titillating vamps or wailing mothers. While rooted in a similar milieu, this film’s human drama has street cred and women who openly express and pursue their desires.

Mahira Khan, one of Pakistan’s highest-paid actresses, told Al Jazeera that she was thrilled to play Mukkho in the film, a character who keeps hitting or hitting on men and breaks gender stereotypes.

“I used to be like: ‘God, Mukkho, get a grip,’ but Mukkho never got a grip,” she said.

“It’s so rare to find a female character in Pakistani, whether it’s cinema or TV, who is just slapping people around, kneeing goons in the balls, which I enjoyed thoroughly because I’ve never really done that in my life.”

Humaima Malik, who plays Daro, Noori Nutt’s beloved sister, said that Lashari asked her not to watch the original film and gave her one reference – Eva Green in 300: Rise of An Empire.

Her Daro inhabits a man’s world and in her opening scene, she walks in on a council of men in the palatial Nutt house and steals the show in a move reminiscent of O-Ren Ishii’s board meeting in Kill Bill I.

‘Anyone cuts anything in this film, I’ll resign’

Every few minutes in The Legend of Maula Jatt, someone threatens or demands that an enemy be chopped into kebab-size chunks. In other words, the violence is graphic.

“A big part of Gandasa films has been all these threats. ‘I’m going to do this to you, you’re this, that…’ So it can’t be all talk and no walk right,” Lashari said.

A source associated with the film told Al Jazeera that when they took the film to the censor board for certification, they loved the film and offered a Universal certificate, granting unrestricted public screening without the need for parental guidance.

“But one lady objected, saying: ‘What are you doing? Heads are being chopped off, sharp weapons are gliding through bodies… How can you?’ At which point the Censor Board chairperson threatened: ‘If anyone cuts anything in this film, I’ll resign.’”