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Two-time Academy Award winner Roger Christian earned an Oscar for his innovative work as Art Director on the original Star Wars film, A New Hope. Christian was responsible for giving the Star Wars sets a kind of convincing detail and ‘used realism' never before seen in science fiction films. Immediately in demand for top-line science fiction films, Christian went on to apply his new approach as Art Director and Production Designer to the original Alien film, for which he received an Academy Award nomination. His film, The Dollar Bottom, meanwhile had won an Academy Award for Best Dramatic Short. Broadening his experience, Christian wrote and then directed the medieval fantasy Black Angel. From that initial outing as a feature film director, Christian has now helmed a total of nine motion pictures including the critically acclaimed Nostradamus which stars Julia Ormond, F. Murray Abraham and Rutger Hauer.

Having come full circle, Christian recently again worked alongside his old colleague George Lucas, this time as Lucas' second unit director on the Star Wars prequel, The Phantom Menace. After 20 years, Christian returned not only to the world of Star Wars but to location shooting in the North African deserts of Tunisia, where he had helped bring the first Star Wars film to life. From studios to wilderness locations, the experience has stood Christian in good stead, and he is now bringing it all to bear on the creation of a new screen epic.

Christian's latest project is the film adaptation of the science fiction adventure Battlefield Earth, starring John Travolta, Barry Pepper and Forest Whitaker. Bringing a strong sense of vision of Battlefield Earth, Christian is crafting a film version that remains true to the spirit of the book while creating an innovative look and a new approach not seen before in science fiction cinema.

It was George Lucas who suggested Christian as the right person to bring Battlefield Earth to the screen, as years ago it was Lucas who encouraged Christian's first directorial effort.

Christian got his start as a director, he says, after his distinctive work on Star Wars: A New Hope and Aliens. Following art direction on those two films he went back to film school to broaden his skills. He then wrote the medieval fantasy, Black Angel, which was too expensive to produce at the time. Chance and opportunity merged, however, when Christian met a 20th Century Fox film executive and told him about the script. George Lucas got hold of and read the screenplay and gave Fox his endorsement, at which point Fox financed the production and Christian directed his first feature film. Black Angel was shown in England as an advance feature with The Empire Strikes Back