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The Classical Movie Contest was a brickfilming contest hosted by Jason Rowoldt in 2001. It was the first successful contest ever hosted on Brickfilms.com and is the earliest known example of a brickfilming contest with no involvement from The LEGO Group. The aim of the contest was to produce a brickfilm set to a piece of classical music.

The Classical Movie Contest was followed by the Historical Fiction Contest later in the same year.

History[]

Jason Rowoldt first mentioned planning a contest on Brickfilms.com in January 2001, referring to it only as a "Shorts" film contest. On March 4, 2001, Rowoldt announced what was supposed to be the first official Brickfilms.com, named "Based on a True Story".[1] This was a contest for films based on historical events, either told accurately or fictionalised. Rowoldt later edited the announcement to say that this contest had been postponed,[2] and by May, he said it had been cancelled due to a lack of directors wishing to participate.[3] This contest idea would later be used for the second successful Brickfilms.com contest, the Historical Fiction Contest, in December 2001.

The idea for the Classical Movie Contest emerged from a discussion between Thomas Foote and Jason Rowoldt at BrickFest 2001.[4] In July, Jason urged filmers to begin thinking about classical music pieces they might like to use in a film. On July 30th, in celebration of the hundredth brickfilm posted to the site's directory, Jason launched The Brickfilms.com Classical Movie Contest.[5] The theme of this contest was to create a film that primarily featured a piece of classical music as its soundtrack and did not include spoken dialogue, in over 2 and under 5 minutes.[6] The original deadline for the contest was the 15th of September but this was later extended to September 30th.[7]

The Classical Movie Contest received 10 accepted entries,[8] and at least 2 more which were disqualified for not meeting the minimum length requirement.[9] A winning entry from each of the three categories Best Film, Best Cinematography and Best Animation would be chosen from judging by the Brickfilms.com staff combined with results from a public user poll. The winner of Best Film would receive a LEGO Legends series re-issue of the 1986 set Guarded Inn while the winner of Best Cinematography would have a choice between LEGO sets 5920 Island Racer and 6711 Ogel Command Striker, with the winner of Best Animation receiving the remaining prize.[10]

List of all entries:

Film Name Director
The Barber of Seville Stefan van Zwam and Marcel van Zwam
The Briefcase X Stephen Lord
Bush: The Musical Brian Gould
Dance Lesson "Valtsu"
The Evolution of Creation Greg Perry
A Grand and Merry Chase Doug James
Haunting Gibberish Russ Jensen
Labor Union Riot Jonathan Neary
Lega Wars Ben Brenninkmeyer
Military Tattoo at Brickingham Palace Fredrik Christiansen

Winners[]

Listed here are the winning films in each category along with the other nominees.

Best Film
Best Cinematography Best Animation

Another notable film originally intended for entry to this contest is The Gauntlet by Jay Silver, which ultimately was not finished in time for the deadline.[11]

References[]

Official Brickfilms.com competitions (2001 - 2008)
Classical Movie Contest · Historical Fiction Contest · Words of Wisdom Contest · A Peculiar Event Contest · High Adventure Theatre Contest · Heroes and Villains Contest · Ten Lines Contest · Fame, Infamy, and Glory Contest · E.A.S.T.E.R. Festival · Inventions, Discoveries and Extraordinary Achievements Contest · Friendships and Rivalries Contest · Brickfilms Challenge Series

See also: Official Bricks in Motion competitions (2008 - Present) · Official Brickfilms.com by Brick à Brack competitions (2023 - Present)
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