What Happened to Black Water Transit?

Rarely are completed, or even nearly completed, films outright shelved. Most recently, we saw Batgirl, which was in the middle of post-production, get shelved as a tax write-off – but this is not the first film to be shelved during post-production. 2009’s Black Water Transit, a thriller directed by Tony Kaye, starring Laurence Fisbhurne, Brittany Snow, and Karl Urban, was nearly finished before disappearing. Though certainly not a guaranteed hit, the film was slated to be a festival contender, with a rough-cut screening at Cannes. So why was it shelved? 

For years, it seemed as if Black Water Transit wouldn’t even make it to production, much less post-production. Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson were both attached to star at different points, but could never lock down directors, writers, or production companies. Finally, in 2007, Black Water Transit began shooting, only without Willis or Jackson. The two had been replaced by Laurence Fishburne and Karl Urban; the script had been rewritten by Matthew Chapman; Tony Kaye had signed on to direct; and the film was being financed by Capitol Films, a company run by real estate developer turned film producer David Bergstein. But still, the film did not seem like a sure thing. Though Kaye was a wildly successful director of commercials and music videos, he had been infamously blacklisted from the film industry after waging a war with New Line Cinema over the post-production of American History X. And In 2001, Kaye had even derailed a series he was set to shoot with Marlon Brando by arriving dressed as Osama Bin Laden. But after returning to the industry with acclaimed documentary Lake of Fire in 2006, and declaring that his attitude toward the industry had changed, Kaye seemed ready to direct his next feature. 

I first discovered Black Water Transit while going through Kaye’s Letterboxd page, curious about his work. Though Kaye has been hailed as an “auteur,” he has few film credits to his name. Certainly, much of that was because of his post-American History X blacklisting, but even since breaking back into the industry, Kaye hasn’t done much work. Since Lake of Fire, Kaye has actually only completed one project: 2011’s Detachment, starring Adrien Brody. However, this hasn’t stopped Kaye from promising a seemingly endless list of projects. The list of announced but unreleased Kaye films is as follows: Attachment, a thriller starring Sharon Stone and Tom Felton; Lobby Lobster, an experimental film with Nat Faxon (which has apparently already been shot); Humpty Dumpty, a short documentary about his spat with New Line (also shot); Honourable Men, a crime drama; African History Y, with Djimon Hounsou; Stranger Than the Wheel, a drama starring Evan Ross (with whom Kaye shot test footage); Tremendum, a partially animated feature inspired by Kaye’s conversations with Marlon Brando; Lying for a Living, the aborted Brando collaboration; Civil, a drama following the American Civil Rights movement in the 50s; Josie Ho and the Hong Kong Sound, which follows Hong Kong artist Josie Ho; and The Trainer, a dark comedy starring Taylour Paige, Vito Schnabel, and Julia Fox. Obviously, Kaye has no fear of shelving projects. But Black Water Transit is different– it wasn’t Kaye’s choice. 

Rather, producer David Bergstein was responsible. Capitol Films, Bergstein’s company, had failed to produce funds for David O. Russell’s Nailed, prompting eight shutdowns of production. Bergstein blamed this failure on the 2008 financial collapse, but the film and acting guilds pulled out all the same and the film shut down for good. Whatever the reason, Bergstein had run into real financial trouble. As Kaye explained, “The poor company that financed [Black Water Transit], they had big ideas. And for us, the ideas were too big. Unfortunately, they just stretched themselves too thin.”

In 2008, Bergstein and Capitol were sued by Chris Roberts and Ascendant Pictures; Roberts claimed that Bergstein had kicked him off Black Water Transit without paying agreed-upon producer fees. This was later settled out of court by Bergstein himself, but his financial woes continued. Bergstein and Capitol were sued by US Specialty Insurance, the film’s insurance carrier, D.B. Zwirn, a New York hedge fund that had provided Bergstein with over $120 million from 2004-07, and print advertiser XL Laboratories, all separately. Another of Bergstein’s companies, ThinkFilm, was sued by filmmaker Alex Gibney for “fraudulently concealing” its ability to release his film. Most damning, however, was a 2010 lawsuit brought by Cayman Islands financier Aramid Entertainment against Bergstein and his various companies for breach of contract on multiple projects; on Black Water Transit, they claimed that Bergstein demanded $1,775,000 to complete post-production, but never provided any evidence of how that money was actually spent. In desperation, Bergstein claimed the project’s budget had metastasized to $48 million and attempted to get back the money from the completion bond company CineFinance. He also sued the insurance company Aon for $20 million, claiming that they “negligently” sold Capitol a policy that did not cover the millions lost by the departure of Samuel L. Jackson in pre-production. Bergstein then sold the rights to Black Water Transit to the “Black Water Transit Acquisition Company,” a company he appeared to own, for $2 million, though the project was valued at $26 million. Doing this would have allowed Bergstein to sell the film again without paying lenders or mortgage holders, as the initial sale process eliminated all legal and debt obligations. But Bergstein’s attempts failed and Aramid took control of the rights to Black Water Transit, among other films in their lawsuit. Capitol went bankrupt.

After the collapse of Capitol in 2010, Bergstein created a new media company, Pangea Media Group. Bergstein and financial partner Ron Tutor attempted to restart production on Russell’s Nailed, only for Russell to quit, citing the fact that Bergstein and Tutor were forcing producers to cut their fees in half. Russell’s film was eventually re-cut by producer and former Capitol executive, Kia Jam, and released by indie distributor Alchemy as the critically panned romantic comedy Accidental Love. Coincidentally, Jam also worked on Black Water Transit; Kaye specifically cited Jam as the producer he was working with to try to get the film a release. 

Though Bergstein eventually won the rights to Black Water Transit back in 2014, when the Aramid lawsuit was settled, the film still didn’t appear. Just as Bergstein blamed the Nailed shutdowns on the 2008 financial collapse, he blamed the disappearance of Black Water Transit on Kaye, claiming that Kaye hadn’t shot the script they originally agreed to, and that the film was thus commercially unreleasable. Kaye fired back, claiming that this was an excuse Bergstein was making to avoid making payments on the film.  

It’s not clear if Bergstein was right. I attempted to track down the film, to little avail. On Letterboxd, the top review (3.5/5 stars) is from an account claiming to have seen it with “an illegally downloaded copy from beijing.” The account has been inactive for over a year and was not receptive to other inquiries into how they accessed the film prior to that. A Reddit thread interrogating the whereabouts of the film was also a dead end: a few replies indicated that someone does have a copy somewhere, but, mysteriously, moderators removed comments clarifying how they accessed these copies of the film. Finally, a movie piracy website claimed to have the film, but demanded credit card information when I tried to access it. The only footage readily available on the internet is proof-of-concept test footage on YouTube. And the only information I can find about the contents of the film are promotional plot summaries and the reactions of those who saw test screenings at some point between 2009 and 2010. The summaries explain that the film follows shipping executive Jack Vermillion (played by Fishburne), “who finds himself getting more than he bargained for after agreeing to help feds expose smuggler and all-around bad seed Earl Pike (Urban).” In turn, Pike tries to transport “his family’s illegal gun collection to a safe haven, while attempting to get his junkie son freed from prison.” As for the test screening reactions, I could find two online: a Letterboxd review trashing the film as all-caps “BAD” and a Reddit reply claiming it was “mediocre.”  

Ultimately, the entire post-production process for this film seems to be what slowed Kaye’s career in the years following Detachment. He explains, “David O. Russell just stormed back. He’s like a tank. Nobody really gets in his way. With me, it kind of flattened me.” As for Bergstein, he was sentenced to eight years in prison for fraud in 2018, ordered to pay a $250,000 fine and to forfeit any proceeds of the crime.  

In the end, David Bergstein’s poor investments are what killed not just Black Water Transit, but the momentum of Tony Kaye’s career. But things seem to be improving. Bergstein is still jailed, and Kaye seems to be making real progress on his next feature, The Trainer. And, to this day, Kaye hopes to recover the rights to Black Water Transit. Maybe then, it might finally be released. But given Kaye’s track record, who knows. At least we have that YouTube test footage.