Despite the fact that the screenplay was one of the most famous to circulate amongst insiders of the real Hollywood North, the movie still took an incredibly long time to get filmed. The screenplay was originally written in the mid 1980s. There was a serious attempt to film it in 1987, but the plans were ultimately scrubbed.
The character Lindsay Marshall was based on the well-respected Canadian author Margaret Atwood. The first movie adaption of one of her novels Surfacing (1981) had similar problems as the movie "Flight to Bogota" being made in this movie.