For many reasons, I bought ...Illustrated Screenplay a week before the big movie opened. Chiefly, I wanted to know what kind of screenwriter George Lucas is. (I was also caught in a wave of Star Wars hype, from which there was no escape.) The book wound up a handy reference manual as I wrote my review for the finished film, but that doesn't justify its $21 (Canadian) sticker price. (It can be had for much less on-line.)

Though they may be trendy, published screenplays are hardly a new concept. Faber and Faber have been acquiring the rights to scripts for decades; in 1991, Applause released exhaustively annotated editions of James Cameron and William Wisher's Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Richard LaGravanese's (Oscar-nominated) The Fisher King. When I heard that Lucas was going to let the whole world read The Phantom Menace in its blueprint form, I expected a book close in spirit to the former. Alas, ...Illustrated Screenplay is not reminiscent of the Applause texts at all, nor does it resemble the popular "Shooting Script" series from Newmarket Press.

Lucas' shooting draft has been printed on heavy newsprint-type paper and reformatted for (presumably) easier reading. (Character names are in bold type and not centred--all dialogue is flushed left; scene directions, also known as "slugs," are written in italics.) Oodles of terrific storyboards accompany the words, but there's no discussion of the development of these sketches, save for a feeble introduction by The Phantom Menace producer Rick McCallum. (McCallum explains that the script and storyboards were created concurrently.)

That the layout recalls a theatrical play rather than a screenplay is most appropriate, given Lucas's tendency to underdescribe the visuals. Consider his introduction to the leader of those Japanese-sounding aliens who send robots to destroy Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon Jinn in Menace's opening sequence: "...NUTE GUNRAY, a Neimoidian trade viceroy, waits for a reply." Oh, a Neimoidian trade viceroy. Of course. Everybody knows what they look like. (To be fair, I've slogged through many a screenplay hampered by overdescription--The Phantom Menace is a quick read.)

While we're at it, the name Nute Gunray arguably disproves Francis Ford Coppola's recent public statement that Lucas "didn't slough [The Phantom Menace] off." A name like "Nute Gunray" is made up in seconds--it's the kind of moniker that winds up in a sci-fi screenplay or novel as a placeholder for a much less lazily-conceived name. Rarely do brands that stupid survive successive drafts.

By now, most of us have seen Episode I and are aware of its flaws. If nothing else, ...Illustrated Screenplay confirms its problems are rooted in the ambitious yet underdeveloped source material. If you're an aspiring motion picture scribe, I'd recommend dozens of other published screenplays to you ahead of this one (not to mention the awe-inspiring quarterly "Scenario"). If you're an aspiring storyboard artist, by all means this is something you should own: checking out ...Illustrated Screenplay is a fairly inexpensive way to admire the unsung work of Robert Barnes, Peter Chen, and others. If you're a Star Wars completist, you'll be happy to learn that this volume contains snippets of dialogue and action that didn't make the final cut of The Phantom Menace.-Bill Chambers

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