Goofs for
Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) More at IMDbPro »

• Continuity: The shadows that the battle-droids leave on the ground when escorting the captured Queen across the courtyard do not match the shot from above just before the Jedi Knights leap down to rescue them.
  
  
• Continuity: In the final fight scene with Obi-Wan and Darth Maul, Obi-Wan leaps up from the hole, and grabs the lightsaber with his left hand. As he twists above Darth Maul's head, the lightsaber is in his right hand, when he lands, it's in his left hand again.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Qui-Gon and Watto are walking through the junkyard, Watto is not casting a shadow.
  
  

• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: During the final duel between Darth Maul and Obi-Wan Kenobi, you will notice that Obi-Wan cuts Darth Maul's double-bladed lightsaber and it stays activated. In every other movie, when dropped or a wielder is killed, the lightsaber deactivates. However, a lightsaber can be "locked" on (see Episode VI-Return of the Jedi). The second half of Maul's lightsaber flies into the wall and causes damage.
  
  
• Continuity: When the flag-bearers walk across the starting grid of the Boonta Eve Podrace, the position of each person and flag changes between shots.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Qui-Gon asks Obi-Wan to check Anakin's midichlorian count, Obi-Wan says that he has a count of "over twenty thousand", but if you watch his lips he is clearly saying "ten thousand".
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Anakin is being lifted up by Qui Gon Jinn after the pod race, he cheers "Mum, I did it! YEAH!" He says this before his mouth moves.
  
  
• Continuity: During the final fight between Obi Wan and Darth Maul, Maul force pushes Obi Wan into the pit. For the wide shot Maul is seen using his left hand to do this, but for the close up he is using his right hand.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Darth Maul is slashing at Obi-Wan in the pit, sparks form from areas of the pit wall Maul isn't even slashing.
  
  
• Miscellaneous: When leaving Mos Espa for good, Qui-Gon and Anakin are moving at a slow, casual pace. But in their very next scene, they are running frantically toward the ship as if they know they are being followed. This is due to the removal of a scene in the film in which the twosome discovers they are being spied on by one of Darth Maul's probes.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: The aerial traffic on Coruscant repeats itself frequently.
  
  
• Continuity: At the beginning of the Battle of Naboo, the Gungans create a shield around themselves using a number of shield generators on the backs of their mounted creatures. In a later scene, only one of these creatures has a shield generator on its back.
  
  
• Factual errors: Keira Knightley's name is misspelled as Kiera in the end credits.
  
  
• Continuity: After R2-D2 repairs the shield generator, there is a scene where Padme is cleaning up the droid and talking to Anakin. In the last shot of this scene, the film is reversed (mirror image) - evident from R2-D2's features.
  
  
• Continuity: When Qui-Gon delivers the hyperdrive, Obi-Wan's braid is on the left side and not the right. Evidently, this was done deliberately with the intention that the shot would later be flopped, but for some reason it never was, leaving the braid on the wrong side.
  
  
• Continuity: Obi Wan's Padawan braid moves from the left side of his head to the right side and back throughout the film.
  
  
• Continuity: Anakin takes C3PO's eye in his right hand. Transfers it to the left hand. Starts to put the eye on its place. In the very next shot he puts the eye there, but with the right hand.
  
  
• Continuity: When Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are talking to Jar Jar when they first arrive on Naboo, Obi-Wan's hair is wet. When Jar Jar spins around and Obi-Wan is forced to duck, his hair suddenly becomes dry. In the next shot it is wet again.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: As Qui-Gon, Padme, and R2 enter Anakin Skywalker's home Qui-gon introduces himself to Anakin's mother. As Qui-Gon says, "I'm Qui-Gon Jinn", Padme mouths these same words. This might not be visible in the pan and scan version of the film.
  
  
• Continuity: Several times, during the fight scene in the Theed Hangar, the Droidekas are shown shooting, but no lasers are coming out of their guns.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Darth Maul and Obi-Wan are fighting at the end of the film, Darth Maul hits Obi-Wan's light saber three times but there are four clashing sounds.
  
  
• Continuity: Obi-Wan's hair length and style changes between shots, starting when Amidala returns from Coruscant. It goes from spiky to smooth and back once or twice.
  
  
• Continuity: During the fight over and around the droid control ship, Anakin says to R2D2, "I'll try spinning, that's a good trick." Anakin is seen to turn the flight controls to the left, but his craft spins to his right. In an earlier scene (right after the auto pilot is disconnected) Anakin says, "Let's go left", turns the controls to the left, and the scene tilts to Anakin's left, showing that the controls are working backwards in one of the two scenes.
  
  
• Continuity: After Obi-Wan kills Darth Maul, the reflection of his lightsaber blade does not appear in the floor where it did appear before.
  
  
• Continuity: When addressing Boss Nass, Obi-Wan's and Qui-Gon's shadows keep changing direction.
  
  
• Continuity: When Darth Maul is killed, he is holding his lightsaber as he falls. When we switch shots to see him falling, he has no lightsaber and we do not see one falling through the air.
  
  
• Continuity: During the pod race, Anakin's face switches between being dirty and being clean several times.
  
  
• Continuity: When Jar Jar activates the Pit Droid in Watto's shop he knocks over a protocol droid and some other junk. A moment later the droid is upright again.
  
  
• Continuity: Same point-of-view footage of the crowd is used twice during the pod race - watch the characters on the steps make the exact same moves each time.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: In the Boardroom in Otoh Gunga, as Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon turn to leave, you can see Obi-Wan's lapel mic just inside his tunic.
  
  
• Continuity: Part of Darth Maul's lightsaber (his left side) disappears for a few frames during the big lightsaber battle.
  
  
• Continuity: During the podrace, the top of R2-D2's head becomes briefly detached from his body.
  
  
• Continuity: As they enter the hangar on Naboo to prepare for their escape, only three members of the party are reflected in the fighter above them, the others are not.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: As the Jedi run from the droidekas, they disappear (or at least become very faint) briefly. This is a deliberate effect to indicate the speed of their departure.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: There is a support bar visible betweens R2-D2's legs before the gang enters Watto's junk shop
  
  
• Continuity: Upon the Queen's landing to meet the Senate we see loads of air-traffic, yet when they land, there's no reflection of any of the ships flying overhead on the shiny ship itself.
  
  
• Continuity: Anakin's shadow changes direction during his final goodbye to his mother.
  
  
• Continuity: Before the start of the pod race, Sebulba breaks the stabilizer on Anakin's pod. In the following scene, you can clearly see the stabilizer over Sebulba's right shoulder, unbroken.
  
  
• Continuity: During the pod racing scene, Shmi Skywalker watches Anakin's progress using a personal view screen with handles. In the close-up, she is holding a view screen without handles.
  
  
• Continuity: R2-D2 plugs a hose into the ship to get the shield generator working again when the group is running the blockade to get off of Naboo, but in the next shot it is gone.
  
  
• Continuity: R2-D2 is briefly and unaccountably missing from the back of the Queen's ship as they run the blockade.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: As Anakin and Qui-Gon are heading to the Queen's ship, Anakin says, "Qui-Gon sir, wait, I'm tired." But his lips are moving only half the time.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Qui-Gon and Jar Jar are eating the meal at Anakin's house, his mother goes around the table pouring water into everyone's cups. She pretends to pour it into Jar Jar's computer-generated cup, and it sounds as if she does, but no computer-generated water has been added into the scene.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: The droid army is entering the city it cuts to the scene where the Princess is looking out of the window in her palace. As it shows her approach the window you can clearly see a large ILM (Industrial Light & Magic) sign written in what looks like red spray paint at the bottom right hand corner of the screen.
  
  
• Miscellaneous: Queen Amidala slips just after they have taken the viceroy hostage in the throne room.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Darth Maul takes his motorcycle after finding the missing Jedi, you can see a pair of tire tracks from a car or truck.
  
  
• Continuity: When Anakin and Padme arrive at the podracer hanger, Anakin is taller in the close-up shots. The close-up shots were done almost a year after the principal photography.
  
  
• Continuity: When Sebulba is on the verge of running down Anakin during the pod race, there is an over the shoulder shot clearly showing that Sebulba's pod is unmanned. An acknowledged animation error.
  
  
• Continuity: After Daultay Dofine's first line of dialogue ("I knew it! They're here to force a settlement!"), he and Rune Haako switch voices. For the rest of the film, Haako speaks with Dofine's voice, and vice versa.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Queen Amidala is explaining the attack plan and she is on the left side of the screen, her mouth is moving only half of the time.
  
  
• Continuity: In the final scene of the movie, you can see a girl in a peach colored dress standing behind R2-D2 and Anakin. A few shots later, she is seen in the foreground of a shot of children throwing confetti down onto the parade. A few shots later she is back behind R2-D2, Anakin, and the Queen.
  
  
• Continuity: When Darth Maul and Darth Sidious are conversing on Coruscant ("At last we will have revenge!"), Maul's neck is visible beneath his cloak, and is flesh-toned. Everywhere else in the film, his neck is black.
  
  
• Continuity: When Anakin is in the hangar begging Qui-Gon to let him come with them, a yellow stick with a ball on top disappears from the background.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: Before Anakin shoots down the Destroyer Droids in the Theed hangar with the Naboo Starfighter, his mouth is shown moving before he says, "No, wait, here it is" while referring to the starfighter's laser cannon trigger.
  
  
• Continuity: When Amidala's groups and the two Jedi approach the gate that leads to the hangar, while slaughtering battle droids, a laser can be seen hitting Obi-Wan, but he doesn't seems to feel it.
  
  
• Continuity: Senator Palpatine and the Viceroy are about the same height, and Darth Maul taller than both. But in one scene while the Viceroy is sitting and Darth Maul is standing next to him, Darth Maul appears much shorter than usual.
  
  
• Factual errors: When the engines start turning on Anakin's pod racer, they are turning the wrong direction. They should be turning so that the fan blades will force air into the engine, but the direction they are turning, air will blow out the front of the engine.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Anakin is sitting in the Naboo Starfighter cockpit, the text on the side of the cockpit switches back/forth between scenes, revealing the use of mirrored images.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: Tey How says, "Sir, we're losing power. There is some problem with the main reactor... ." When Captain Dofine replies, "Impossible! I don't... .", his lips don't move until he is almost finished speaking. When they move, he appears to be saying "Impossible... ."
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): After Darth Maul is chased into the large room with the chasm by Obi Wan and Qui Gon, he backs off to the edge and the camera goes back to a more distant angle. At that moment Darth Maul seems to almost stumble into the chasm and quickly catch himself again.
  
  
• Continuity: When Qui-Gon and Obi Wan are waiting for Jar Jar to get help from the Gungans we see shadows and light on their faces from the leaves on the trees. These shadows move constantly. In the close upos, they are entirely in shadow and there is no light showing through.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When asked who else has been nominated for Chancellor, Captain Panaka says "Bail Antilles of Alderaan." When in fact it is Bail Organa of Alderaan.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Darth Maul is killed and seen hurtling towards the bottom of the melting pit, you can clearly see his digital form created for this feat.
  
  

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