Breaking the cell

Arthur Pias

Tarsem Singh, whose controversial debut, The Cell, grossed a strong $100 million worldwide last year, has dropped out of the $75 million project, Constantine.

Hollywood Reporter, which broke the story said Singh's exit, had to do with a dispute over the budget.

Nicolas Cage was to star in the film as renegade occultist John Constantine, who teams up with a skeptical policewoman to solve the mysterious suicide of her sister. Their investigation takes them through the world of demons and angels that exists beneath contemporary Los Angeles.

The film, based on the DC-Vertigo comic book Hellblazer, would have been a big career boost for Singh, whose previous film, starring Jennifer Lopez, cost about $35 million.

"I had waited for ten years to make my first film and I made it on my own terms," Singh had stated in an interview soon after the release of The Cell.

"I don't want to take up projects that do not stimulate me sufficiently," he added.

As for the violent content of his film, Singh, 40, said he had taken his 70-year-old mother to see it. And not once did she close her eyes or squirm in the seat, he laughed.

Singh, one of the more successful ad filmmakers on both sides of the Atlantic, also directed REM's video Losing My Religion in 1991.

Akiva Goldsman, who won a Golden Globe for his screenplay for A Beautiful Mind, was also involved in the Warner Bros production of Constantine.