Much grinding of corporate teeth and gleeful rubbing of tabloid palms in Hollywood this week, as Steven Spielberg found himself - not for the first time - on the receiving end of accusations from an unknown would-be player claiming plagiarism by the bearded auteur and his minions.

The gory details, as revealed in a lawsuit filed last Thursday at LA District Court by obscure film-maker Gregory Grant, specify that Spielberg and his cohorts at Dreamworks pinched their idea for 1998's animated message-flick Small Soldiers from his 1991 short Ode To GI Joe. According to Grant's version of events, Dreamworks and parent company Universal had, for some time, been considering expanding the aforementioned Ode - which did the rounds of the festival circuit during the early 90s - into a feature proper, before dropping the idea on the grounds they "weren't interested in making a movie about toy dolls".

So imagine Grant's surprise when, a fortnight later, Spielberg personally announced the production of an animated movie about toy action figures who come to life and wreak havoc on a small American town, to be directed by the masterful Joe Dante. And then picture his face when, as alleged in the suit, several scenes from Ode were "directly lifted" for the subsequent Dreamworks project.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, considering the bad publicity which surrounded their handling of similar cases involving both Twister and Amistad, Dreamworks made no comment, although Grant's attorney Ira Reiner had enough for both parties. "This is not the stereotypical case of the producer getting a script left in a taxicab", he told reporters. "Grant graduated from film school, won several awards, and was asked to write a treatment and submit videos." Unsurprisingly, the plaintiff is now seeking unspecified monetary damages: watch this out-of-court settlement-sized space.