Director Peter Weir ("Master and Commander", "The Truman Show") has left Warner Bros. "Shantaram" project, mere days after the studio received a Weir-supervised rewrite from award-winning scribe Eric Roth reports Variety.

Various source Weir had disagreements over the film's direction with both star/producer Johnny Depp and the studio. A WB spokesman says "Peter moved on from this film because his interpretation of it differed greatly than that of the studio and producers".

Depp is still expected to star in the adaptation of the Gregory David Roberts novel, in which would play an Australian heroin addict who escapes a maximum-security prison.

Once out, he reinvents himself as a doctor in the slums of India and winds up a gun-runner and counterfeiter who fights against invading Russian troops in Afghanistan.

Warners has begun talking to directors to replace Weir and still aims to begin filming by spring 2007 in India, Spain and the U.K.