The latest film project of Terry Gilliam, to create a £22m modern day Don Quixote, was floundering yesterday after a hernia left his veteran star unable to ride a horse, never mind tilt at windmills.

Gilliam, frequently described as Quixotic, is now as famous for his epic films and equally epic budgets as he is for his part in the Monty Python team. He was reported to be utterly dismayed by the news, which has stopped filming just six weeks into the shoot.

He conceived the part of Don Quixote for the 70-year-old French actor Jean Rochefort, who fell ill after three weeks and has been ordered to stop working "indefinitely".

Producer Rene Cleitman told the trade paper Variety yesterday that they had hit "one of the thorniest problems in our industry. We will abandon the filming for the moment but we intend to begin from zero with the actors when we can."

The delay is certain to cost the film some of its stars, including Vanessa Paradis who has recording commitments.

There was some comfort for the producers that her partner, Johnny Depp, who wakes up to discover he has become Sancho Panza, promised to stick with the project and to clear his schedule whenever filming resumes.

Filming began in Spain last month, with a cast including Britons Miranda Richardson and Christopher Eccleston.

Gilliam has spent years raising the money, and collecting Spanish, British, German and French co-producers, to make the film without a US backer - he has been a bitter critic of Hollywood as favouring bland crowd pleasers.

Insurers have been called in to evaluate potential losses, and whether it is worth resuming filming in the new year.

Gilliam's films include spectacular successes and disasters. Apart from the Python films, most of his own creations have a rich vein of fantasy including Jabberwocky, based on the Lewis Carroll poem and starring Michael Palin, Time Bandits, Brazil - only released after battles with his studio - The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, which cost and lost a large fortune, The Fisher King, Twelve Monkeys, and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.