www.variety.com reports that Warner Bros. Pictures and New Regency have partnered to co-finance Darren Aronofsky's The Fountain (a.k.a. The Last Man), a sci-fi epic that will star Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. The companies are currently trying to determine a start date for the production which is budgeted north of $70 million. New Regency replaces Village Roadshow Pictures, which was originally expected to co-finance the pic.

Aronofsky's road toward production on this pic has been a rocky one, says the trade. Village Roadshow came aboard last year when the film was targeted for a fall 2001 start and a fall 2002 release. However, the studio then pushed its production target to this summer. The move was to accommodate Warners' concerns over the budget and script as well as Blanchett's pregnancy.

While "Fountain" is expected to be as visually ambitious as "Matrix," Aronofsky's project isn't expected to have the benefit of being a potential franchise.

Aronofsky and Ari Handel wrote the script, which has been kept tightly under wraps. Aronofsky will produce with Eric Watson, his partner in Protozoa Pictures.