PFCRonin – The Next Generation of Movie Reviewers : Call for Entries
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Game On! Time to play. And play hard. And the playground to battle it out is open to everyone (well… most of you). So without wasting any more time, here’s what PFCRonin is all about…
Announcing PFCRonin
The contest to search for the best of the best. In movie reviewing. So lets begin…
What is PFCRonin?
Ronin \Ro”nin”\, n. [Jap. r[=o]-nin, fr. Chin. lang profligate,
lawless + j[^e]n (old sound n[=i]n) man.]
a samurai with no group, clan or master – he is the outsider, the outcast
This is a contest to search for the next generation of movie reviewers. You are a movie fan, a blogger, a writer, have been reviewing movies on your website, blogsite, over chai sessions or simply screaming it out at the end of the movie. The contest is our way of searching the next kickass movie reviewer. You may be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, programmer, student, housewife, part time blogger and anything else but definitely not a professional movie reviewer. Yes you. We are looking for the true Ronin – the Samurai amongst the movie reviewers who stands ALONE
For six rounds you will be tested in your range, your depth, your sensibilities towards cinema, your humor or your seriousness, your focus all this in the form of movie reviews. Of course we are expecting tons of knowledge and (ahem) attitude too!
Six rounds. One movie in each round. The winner at the end of the sixth round will be the PFCRonin of Season One.
This contest is open to all. Even PFC Authors, except those authors who will be involved in organizing the contest. So that leaves out Anurag (darn) and me (double darn!)… and perhaps one or two others.
Out of the six rounds only – Round One – will be an elimination round. In Round One, of all the entries received, the 10 best reviewers will be selected by an PFC author panel (who will not participate in the contest).
The ten best reviewers of Round One will then battle it out through Rounds 2 to 6, which will be judged by panel of esteemed non-PFC jury members. Each of the ten contestants will have to participate in each of the rounds after round one. All ten contestants will participate until round 6, at the end of which the one with the highest points will be declared the PFCRonin
The Contest Details
Round 1 – Elimination Round
In this round everyone who would like to participate in the contest will be required to send a review of the movie:
Taare Zameen Par
January 5th— Last date for receiving your review to enter the contest
January 6— the short listed contestants (chosen by the PFC authors panel) are announced
Round 2
January 9— the movie for Round 2 is announced (in PFC Buzz section)
January 13— the date by which the ten contestants should submit their reviews
January 14— the movie reviews are published on PFC
Round 3
January 16— the movie for Round 3 is announced
January 20— the date by which the ten contestants should submit their reviews
January 21— the movie reviews are published.
Round 4
January 23— the movie for Round 4 is announced
January 27— the date by which the ten contestants should submit their reviews
January 28— the movie reviews are published.
Round 5
January 30—the movie for Round 5 is announced
February 3— the date by which the ten contestants should submit their reviews
February 4— the movie reviews are published
Round 6
February 6— the movie for Round 6 is announced
February 10— the date by which the ten contestants should submit their reviews
February 11— the movie reviews are published
The winner of PFCRonin will be announced on February 23rd.
The Jury
Please give a warm welcome to the esteemed panel of jury that will preside over Rounds 2 to 6 to select the PFCRonin (in alphabetical order)…
Shoma Choudhary (Tehelka.com)
Namrata Joshi (Outlook)
Nandini Ramnath (Timeout Mumbai)
Naman Ramachandran (Euphoria, Sight and Sound, Total Film, UK)
Baradwaj Rangan (New Sunday Express)
Raja Sen (Rediff.com)
Mayank Shekhar (Mumbai Mirror)
The Prize
Ok… now some of you must be reading this section first. And some who diligently read the post so far, line by line, may have this question popping up – “So what’s the prize?”
An Invitation from the firebrand media firm – TEHELKA – to write movie reviews for them once a month
The Rules, Guidlelines and Submission Form
About your Reviews
1. Your reviews should not be more than 650 words in length. Entries that have more than the required word limit will be rejected.
2. You can only submit one review in a round.
3. Please submit your reviews ONLY IN PLAIN TEXT. That means NO Attachments, NO Word formatting (No bold, italics, underline etc.).
4. Your submission should be original and written by you. Any copying in part or whole, will be rejected the original source from which the submission is copied will be notified of your act.
5. All last dates of submission are in Pacific Standard Time, ending at 10pm PST (Pacific times are 13 and a half hours behind Indian standard time)
6. Reviews only in English Language will be accepted.
7. Incomplete submission forms will be rejected. Please ensure you copy and paste and fill completely the submission form below
Submission Form
The form and your movie-review should be emailed to us at
pfccontest [at] gmail [dot] com
Last date of accepting entries : January 5th, 2008
Please paste the form below in the body of the email you send us along with your attached movie. The form and your movie-review should be in ONE email only. Please ensure EVERYTHING in the form below is pasted in the email, including your acceptance of PFCRonin rules statement. We are unable to accept Entries with incomplete forms or those emails that have attachments.
start copy***************** PFCRonin Season One Submission Form **************************
Email Subject : Submission for PFCRonin Season One
Email Body:
Your Name:
Your Email:
Your Phone: (will not be published)
Your City, Country:
I confirm that I have written this movie review that I am submitting in this email for PFCRonin Season One contest.
Title of your Movie Review:
Movie Review: (650 word limit. Please enter below your movie review for Round One – ‘Taare Zameen Par’)
I have read the PFCRonin Rules and Disclaimer and accept and agree to all points mentioned in the PFCRonin Rules and Disclaimer at http://passionforcinema.com/pfcroninrules.html
Signed,
(Enter your Full Name here)
*************************************************************************end copy
Spread the Good Word
We encourage you to spread the word around and lend your support to the contest. Please email the following link to everyone you know :
http://passionforcinema.com/pfcronin-seasonone/
If you have a blog or a website we encourage you to put the PFCRonin info on your website by adding any of the following buttons
Copy and Paste the following code on your website:
Copy and Paste the following code on your website:
Copy and Paste the following code on your website:
Sponsors and Advertisers
We are inviting sponsors and advertisements for the event. Please use our contact form to get in touch for our Sponsorship and Advertisement Package.
Tags: PFCRonin
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Oh My Good Lord!!
This looks sooooo fascinating!!!!!!
What a concept.
And so depressing coz I will be in rural Gautemala for a shoot-2 weeks in Jan – and if you want us to review Hollywood/Bollywood I am done for :((
This weekly deadline cannot be extended?
]
Meaning if I want to send in 2 reviews after I get back will that work??
[ provided am among the 10, I get that
Life is like,so not fair, sometimes…..
K
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All you Ronin’s out there… come up for the challenge! Lets show em all….
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Wow seems so interesting…
OZ: Something not so related..In my RSS reader there was a post on Blood Brothers by Vishal which is strangely not published on PFC..Anyway the movie is available at Indiafm and possibly on other video websites too..Very nice short indeed.
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One question – _why_ is the deadline in Pacific Time, and not in IST?
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Sexy Stuff Oz!
Next Generation of Films (& Filmmakers) deserve Conscientious Reviewers.. The Next Generation of Reviewers – Nothing Less! Great initiative PFC..
let’s kick some ASS!!!
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http://sacredmediacow.com/?p=989
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- Kavita, darn! lets begin with Round 1 and get your review in
- Ankit, thanks. yeah it had to be withdrawn because a few commenters pointed out it had some discrepancies.
- Phoenix, So I can work on the backend in the evenings here in California (PST)
- Thani, yeeeeeeeeeaaah!!!!!!
- Kabir, Thanks!
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Oz can you somehow BAR/PREVENT/BAN
Thani/Dabba/Mainak/WB/Subrat/Padmaja
/Zeitgeist/Bhavani/Sreehari/Siddharth from participating?
Dus tho yahin ho gaye :((
Muh Maanga Inam Milaygaa!!
Thank God for small mercies ki you are out of it….
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- Kavita, you forgot to add in your list the firecracker of a reviewer – Kartik Krishnan… and he’s gonna be taking part in PFCRonin
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Oh I thought he might have been ‘ban-ished anyways after his last post on KKC…
No?
The WINTER OF DISCONTENT starts.
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@ kavita –
thanks for including me in ur list of potential ronins but rest asssured, there will be no competition from me. i don’t do reviews. the rest though, u have to watch out for. thani and subrat especially, have some mad skillz.
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who u calling a Ho?
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Can Munnabhai and Circuit write a review? :D (seriously)
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Dabba:
You don’t do reviews!!
You deserve to be invited to my famous brunches :d
Will have to climb up the Tirupati Konda [ hill ]
to thank Venkat .
1 down 9 to go…..
and then right on cue Machchar arrives.
Aa daykhayn zaraa kis may kitna hai dum!!!!!!!!!
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Whoa! This is a cool one! Now I have more than one reasons for TZP to release!
) Thanks PFC!
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awesome!
And do we (aam junta, non-writers) get to read these reviews? I mean from 2nd round onwards.
you know, to give our expert comments on how bad/good was the jury’s decision :P
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@k-3
so long as mary is at the brunch too, and please let her be bloody.
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Oz, will the movies be available at theaters in the U.S. and other countries, or just India? TZP will definitely play here.
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dabba:
alas!only virgins in paradise.
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Oz,
First, congratulations for starting this contest! I really like the way you are constantly coming up with new ways to keep PFC an exciting and happening place to read and to participate in. First the one-minute movie contest, then publishing various film scripts, and now this reviewing contest. It shows that you are really serious about doing something to improve the state of cinema.
OK, so my question is: What film are people supposed to review for round 1? Is it left up to their choice? Should it be an Indian film? A Hindi film? Any world film that is available on DVD? How recent must the film be?
I would appreciate receiving clarification on these points.
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- Evelyn, Yes. We will be trying our best to announce movies that get a worldwide release or are easily available on DVD around the globe.
- Neeraja, the reviews of all the 10 contestants will be published in each round. The dates for those are mentioned above.
- SM, thanks. Movie to review on Round One is “Taare Zameen Par”
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Thanks for the response, Oz. This will get me out to see TZP.
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Oz… is it necessary to show your artistic language power in pfc ronin? i am not comfortable with it. i can express my views in simple manner due to my limited english vocabulary.
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- Shailesh, no it is not necessary.
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WHO EVER CAME UP WITH THIS IDEA , HATS OFF TO THEM. I REALLY LOVE THIS WEBSITE, THERE IS ALWAYS SOME THING NEW , AND MOST IMPORTANTLY IT PROVIDES PLATFORM FOR BUDDING GENIUS; BEYOND THE BORDERS.
THANKS FOR MAKING P.F.C
^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^^:)^
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@oz
lol! sorry, overlooked that part.
@Evelyn Tu
other countries = ???
definitely not in france :((:((:((
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hii OZ…. stupid question but.. wht shud i write in the email body ?? dint get tht ?
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Oz
get them back, get them back
No Dabba, No Bhavani :(
If either Thani or Subrat back out now
I will surrender >:p
No fun if it ain’t a fair fight to finish……
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- Neeraj, check the “Submission Form” above. It has the details.
- Kavita, You are underestimating the stupendous bloggers outside PFC who write kickass reviews. Some have already emailed me that they will be jumping in to stake their claim for the title.
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@Oz ..
Liked the PFCRonin posters – they are kickass themselves … did you alone work on them ?
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turrtle, our very own PFC author Dpac is responsible for realizing oz’s idea of what the poster should look like. in short…
idea: oz
creation: Dpac
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Dpac = Zatoichi = pure (%)
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Congratulations on another great idea. You guys do put your money where your mouth is. Can I ask who will select the ten finalists? Is there a jury for that, or do the readers get to vote?
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Oz, if I decide to participate in this, does it mean that I will have to refrain from posting the same review on my blog? The rules don’t say anything about this, but just want to be sure.
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- Aditya, You can post your review that your submit in the contest on your own blog or anywhere else too.
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This sounds excellent. I am excited as someone who will only be reading the reviews. Excited that there will be less/no bias irrespective of whether the opinion of the reviewer is agreeable or no.
I would like to suggest to perhaps make space for 2 reviews of the same movie. As we are well aware, there are some extremely good writers here on PFC. All undeniably well versed with movies and the ‘English’ language. Some with a bigger ego than others. So am just hoping it does not become a vocab-fest and the reviews remain accessible to everyone’s understanding and interest.
Kavita has already short-listed an elite group of people on basis of how they write (including herself). Maybe one of these would win and it would ensure some great reviews. However, I still think there is space and appetite for a ‘Machchar’ style review as well.
Also, I feel the reviews should not allow for comments. These should ideally just be an article with no ‘Comments’ tab at all. You could perhaps have an ‘poll’ at the bottom of the review instead. By disabling comments, we would avoid unnecessary debates and reviews would continue to remain just reviews.
Best of luck.
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Hey OZ
Major problem. I live in Gujarat and it seems likely that Taare Zameen Par will not be releasing here due to some stupid political idiots. And I really would love to participate in this contest. So now what??:(
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Saad, the last date to send in your review is Jan 5. Hopefully you will get a chance to watch the movie in the next two weeks.
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@turttle…
thanks but all sabaashis and juuutthes for oz…
@k3…
theres one big khilaaadi in between oz n me
my mai-baaap.. my sarkaaaar… commandant… WB!!
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@Saad :
Where are you in Gujarat?
Cross the Border and watch it na…..
@ WB: Khilaadiyon ka Khilaadi!!
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Saad… (if last minute problem would not arise) TZP is released in Ahmedabad, Mehsana and all other cities of gujarat except vadodara.
u can go to Anand or Bharuch for TZP.
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Damn Vadodara!
Guess some single screens are releasing the film. Just checked the papers today. Otherwise will corss the border or go to a’bd to watch it.
Sheesh we call ourselves a democracy when we shun artistic freedom over a persons views.
Anyways thank you all especially pfc :d
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Oz,
You guys at PFC couldn’t have selected a better movie to kickstart Ronin and do the elimination as well. Saw the movie first day first show and am still speechless…
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Hindi Filmein aur Review contest sirf ANGREZI me.. bahut Na-insafi hai… |-)
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main sahmat hoon pavan jha se.
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PFC Ronin…here I come..
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I’ll be the only one here who won’t be able to watch TZP in time :((:((:((
Does anyone know if its going to be released in Paris?
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Well I suggest that instead of Round 2 being yet another review writing, it would be pretty good if a bunch of short listed reviewers are invited to pen down an article of sorts for the ‘BEST of 2007′ or more on the lines of ‘2007: A REVIEW’ whereby the writer gets to discuss the best five flicks or even worst, and convince us with his/her points.
This would help in ascertaining the overall taste and sensibilities of the writer with movies which we all would have seen by then. This gives the writer to cover a range of genres and styles and provide us in turn with his ‘general outlook’ towards cinema.
Chopping the reviews down to the final 10 would make sense after such a round.
What say, Oz? Definitely a suggestion that you could look into!
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Are you going to send any acknowledgment to the people who submit their entries. Just so that they know the entry was received
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Do we need to give STARS (***5/11 or **17/23) like our bhailog?
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@Neeraja …you are not the only one ..TZP is not released in Bristol …..and it seems it is not going to release ……i am feeling so sad from friday after the responses have started pouring in ….:(( :((
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I know! :(( My friend tell me it was released in Sharjah a day before it was released in India!
can you believe that, so unfair :((
I hereby form an anti-AK club x(
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*tells
sorry for the typo.
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PFC – You guys rock! Great idea! Something good will come out of all this. Lazy people like me will get some enthu to write ijjat se. hehe
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Hey OZ and all,
Watch out for my review. I have never posted on this site before, I always post on my own site (sanjitdang.com). But this time, I’ll submit my TZP review to this contest…..and there ain’t anybody better a critic and a writer than yours truly:)
-Looking fwd to enjoyment,
Sanjit
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OZ,
Dont you think that a word count of 650 words is a bit too harsh and that too for a movie like TZP?
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:d/ gr8 contest…
By review: do u mean we include the gist of the story or just dive into what we thought about it. A movie like ‘TZP’ you could review it either way.. :(
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Sounds good to me. Am in!
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Just one query Oz: After I have submitted my review for the contest (which i have, today), can I host the review on my personal blog or is it restricted by the contest rules till the results are out?
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Yes you can Varun
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That was a very sweet question. I was planning to host the review on my own blog without asking if the contest rules restricted it.
Although come to think about it, its probably best if you didnt, Varun. What if someone else copied your review from your blog & submitted it in your name? :-?
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@ OZ
Thanks for the quick reply.
@ Rinchen
Thanks for the scare man. But then, the old writer’s tool (date-time stamp of the submission) will come handy in case of somebody copying it…
You know, before the Bombay Film Industry had a dedicated ‘Film Writer’s Association’, people used to ‘register’ their works by posting their scripts to their own address and not opening the sealed envelope. The government department’s (postal) date-time stamp would act as a clincher if a copyright conflict arose. :-)
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oz, just wondering if one should expect any acknowledgement when a review has been received by PFC.
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Thats some piece of information, Varun. Varun Grover! Familiar name..
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I didnt know that. Also I noticed you didnt include your webpage id. Guess who first thought about taking a sneak peak at the review
>-
Good luck!
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@ Amit
There are writers who still swear by this old method of ‘posting-it-to-yourself’…believing FWA is just a dummy body with little clout in solving high-profile conflicts.
@Rinchen
Yet again thanks for the scare. And for the good luck too.
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There was some reason to visit PFC and read. Now this PFC Ronin is an interestinf concept but look look at the ridiculous jury!!!
Leave the rest aside as I dont even know them but
Namrata Joshi (Outlook), Nandini Ramnath (Timeout Mumbai),Raja Sen (Rediff.com) and Mayank Shekhar (Mumbai Mirror). Who the hell these people are and what will they judge? Its a shame to read their reviews in the paper! Sorry PFC!!! This one is out of character! BEST OF LUCK ???
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OZ… how can we know that entry for PFC ronin is accepted? or acknolwdgement ????
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a suggestion
start a topic ‘favorite ten’
like it is in ’senseofcinema’ site.
like comments, everybody can post his ten.
8-x
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waiting for the results…….anxious….this is the first time i wrote a review….probably it stanked…but then again one cannot give up hope
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I will only let a jury of my peers judge me if I was indicted of a crime, and brought before a judge.
MAke me a jury of filmmakers and I’ll be happy to submit to a competition.
Good luck to everyone participating here.
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Hey… this one competition is damn kool.
Anxiously waiting for the top ten reviews.
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Hi Oz,
I just submitted it. Can u pl confirm if you recd it?
thanks
Sanjit
sanjits@gmail.com
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when is the list getting out??????
HOW LONG STIL??????
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hey wheres the list?? can any1 help to know wheres d list.. or when the list’s gonna be out???
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HOW LONG IS IT GONNNA TAKE???
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