A Peculiar Event Contest

The A Peculiar Event Contest was a brickfilming contest hosted by Joshua Leasure between 2003 and 2004. The aim of the contest was to make a brickfilm centering around a strange occurance, ideally including a twist ending. It was the fourth official Brickfilms.com contest and was preceded by the Words of Wisdom Contest. It was followed by the High Adventure Theatre Contest in 2004. The theme "A Peculiar Event" was reprised in 2016 as the theme of the thirteenth Twenty-four Hour Animation Contest.

History
A Peculiar Event was the second official Brickfilms.com contest hosted by Joshua Leasure and the second since the 2003 site redesign. It was announced on the 11th of December 2003, just under three months since the Words of Wisdom Contest had ended. The theme of peculiar events with a recommended twist ending was compared in the announcement to the TV series The Twilight Zone, a likely inspiration on the contest. The original deadline of the contest was in the first half of February 2004, but this was later extended to February 16th. The contest received 28 entries.

Judging
Rather than having entrants vote between every entry like in the previous contest, it was decided that a committee would create a shortlist of nominees to be voted between. The committee consisted of Leasure, "The Sisters" (Kim and Esmerelda Buccaneer), Paul Howell of Stop Motion Pro and any Review Panel member or Patron Saint member who did not enter the contest, with Seth Rotkin of Cool Brick Movies also being added later. Once the committee had narrowed down the selection to ten films, public voting began and any entrant who did not have a nominated film or any member who was a Patron 24fps or higher was allowed to submit a ballot ranking the films in the categories of Story, General Presentation, Sound, and Animation, with Story counting the most towards the final score at 50%.

The contest offered a copy of the animation software Stop-Motion Pro as the prize for first place. Second place would win the LEGO set 9293 Community Workers and third place would win 10067 Minifigure Headgear. There were also two additional award categories offered by and judged exclusively by Kim and Esmerelda Buccaneer. 'The Sisters Award' would go to a promising young director and they would present a QuickCam Pro 4000 to one of the entrants after considering age, recent filmography and camera quality. 'The Mister Rogers Award' would go to the film with the most clever use of the line, "Hey, that's my monkey!" either spoken or written, and the prize was the Mega Bloks set 9881 Dragons: Battle Gate.

Top 10

 * 1. || The Hand of Fate || Dave Corbett
 * 2. || Hit & Run || Nick Maniatis
 * 3. || Reality (What a Concept) || Mark Butler
 * 4. || Prey || James Jannicelli
 * 5. || A Frosty Welcome || Christoph Brock
 * 6. || About a Door || Holger Imig
 * 7. || The Museum || Jonathan Williams
 * 8. || Cause & Effect(s) || Andreas Feix
 * 9. || Abducted! || Jonathan Hellerman, Nathanael Hellerman and Billy Gribbin
 * 10. || An'D || Richard Creel
 * 6. || About a Door || Holger Imig
 * 7. || The Museum || Jonathan Williams
 * 8. || Cause & Effect(s) || Andreas Feix
 * 9. || Abducted! || Jonathan Hellerman, Nathanael Hellerman and Billy Gribbin
 * 10. || An'D || Richard Creel
 * 8. || Cause & Effect(s) || Andreas Feix
 * 9. || Abducted! || Jonathan Hellerman, Nathanael Hellerman and Billy Gribbin
 * 10. || An'D || Richard Creel
 * 10. || An'D || Richard Creel
 * 10. || An'D || Richard Creel

The Sisters' Awards
'The Sisters Award' for promising young director went to The Museum by Jonathan Williams, who was 14 at the time.

'The Mister Rogers Award' for cleverest use of the phrase, "Hey, that's my monkey!" went to Lionheart's Birthday by Dirk Boettcher, which featured a dance party to a song with the line as its title and lyrics.