In December 1997, the project was called into question when the projected budget escalated to $108 million due to media and shareholder scrutiny of the studio in financing a big-budget film. Scott rewrote the script in an attempt to reduce the film's budget by $20 million, but in March 1998, the studio canceled the project due to continued budgetary concerns, and quite possibly to the box office failures of Scott's last three films, "", "White Squall", and "G.I. Jane". Likewise, Schwarzenegger's recent films at the time ("Eraser" and Warner Bros. own "Batman & Robin") also underperformed, and the studio's latest experiences with big budget sci-fi movies "Sphere" and "The Postman" were negative as well. In August 1998, director Rob Bowman was attached to the project, with Protosevich hired to write a third all-new draft, far more action-oriented than his previous versions, but the director (who reportedly wished for Nicolas Cage to play the lead) moved on to direct "Reign of Fire" and the project did not get off the ground.