Montreal: Significant cost overruns on the Kingsborough Greenlight Pictures feature To Walk With Lions has led to a split between Kingsborough chairman Pieter Kroonenburg and the film’s executive producer and company director John Buchanan. The film completed principal photography on location in Kenya last month.

Buchanan is no longer a director of the company or the production entity, Kingsborough Lions. He intends to produce and coproduce new movies, including projects with the u.k. through his own production company, Eclectic Media.

At press time, To Walk With Lions had not been taken over by the film’s guarantor, The Completion Guarantors. TCG Montreal vp Ronald Legault says, ‘There are financial problems but [the film] has not been taken over.’

The picture garnered real theatrical interest at the recent Cannes Film Festival, however, additional financing is needed to complete the post-production, including sound and music components.

The extent of refinancing the us$9.2-million production, including the overrun and completion costs, is unknown, although it’s likely to be somewhere between $1 million and $2 million.

Part of the back rent includes insurance premiums and union dues deductions not remitted on behalf of DGC-Quebec and stcvq members.

stcvq director Pierre Lafrance says the owed deductions, considered by the tough-talking union as part of a technician’s salary, total more than $70,000. Lafrance says he’s talking to Legault, and adds the union ‘will seize the picture’ if the money is not paid.

The dgc’s Quebec business agent Fortner Anderson says, ‘The guild will be watching closely as Pieter attempts to refinance the picture.’

As for Legault, he says he’s in it for the investors.