The visionary American film director has nine months to pay a settlement sum with the financiers of Voyage of Time, an epoch-straddling documentary that remains unfinished

Terrence Malick has come to a settlement with the financiers of his film Voyage of Time, which has remained unfinished since its inception in 2008.

Investment group Seven Seas Partnership, who financed the film, sued Malick's company Sycamore Pictures last year claiming that nearly $6m had been spent but on the production but "with nothing to show for it". They highlighted how he instead spent time on other projects including To The Wonder and the forthcoming Knight of Cups, said that their money was "co-mingled with other financial assets to support the production of other films by Malick," and that he had indeed "forgotten" about the project.

Sycamore countersued, saying that the action brought against them was concocted to cover up Seven Seas having run out of money for the film, and as "pretext" for them pulling out of the deal. Sycamore maintain that the money was used properly, and that they had a rough draft of the documentary.

Now each case could be dissolved as part of a settlement between the two companies. Sycamore must satisfy an undisclosed "payment obligation to Seven Seas" within nine months, "or such longer period as agreed in writing by the parties" – if that is done, the case against Sycamore will be dropped.

Voyage of Time is to be a documentary narrated by Brad Pitt and Emma Thompson, concerning nothing less than "the whole of time, from the birth of the universe to its final collapse". Malick once described it as "one of my greatest dreams", and mooted shooting locations include Hawaii, Iceland, Papau New Guinea and Chile. An Academy Award-winning special effects artist was hired, but later left the project.

In a recent interview with Collider, Thompson said she recorded her narration "about a year and a half ago... It was very mysterious and it was very free flow as well. [Malick]'s a very free kind of guy."