No surprise, Hollywood deems The Weekly Standard horrid enough to appeal to the villain in The Three Stooges: The Movie.

Wise guys, eh?

PBS released a great article last week offering some guidance to filmmakers trying to navigate the social media world. Their six “golden rules” suggest how filmmakers can increase audience engagement–and get the most out of critical platforms like Twitter. Here’s a quick summary:

What’s the best way to ensure a successful a Kickstarter campaign? How do I self-distribute, or digitally distribute my film well? What should I post on my Facebook page as opposed to my Twitter feed? What if I’m not on Twitter?
[...]
Engage your audience.

Seems simple enough, yet many people–filmmakers or not–fail to see that simply posting content relevant to your project or career will not necessarily engage an audience and get them interested. Just throwing a trailer up somewhere will not ensure that many people will watch it, especially when you are competing with a wealth of viral videos and blog posts that are crowding everyone’s Twitter and Facebook feeds.

So now that filmmakers have a focus, how should they go about achieving that engagement?

1) Be a person. First and foremost. No one wants to connect with at spam bot, or with something that seems like a shameless self-promotion.
[...]
2) Join the conversation. Documentary filmmakers are in a unique space in the digital realm in that the subjects and issues they deal with typically already have a strong community and dialogue online. Tap into those conversations, not by simply saying, “Watch my doc!” but by posting your interests and viewpoints, maybe giving some anecdotes.
[...]
3) Try transmedia. If you think it is suited to your project, tap into transmedia strategies and the possibility of expanding your stories over multiple platforms.
[...]
4) Fish where the fish are. On the subject of distribution, La’Bassiere said she’s worked with too many filmmakers who want their film to be on every platform and everywhere.
[...]
5) Don’t sell something people can’t buy. Your Twitter feed should never look like this: “3 weeks till our film is on iTunes!,” “In 3 weeks you will be able to get our film on iTunes,” “Excited for our film?,” “Another week down, you will have it soon.” In other words, don’t talk at your audience. Instead give them something to do….Audiences want to be prompted with an action, not with a wait.
[...]
6) Ask your audience. Filmmaker Gary Hustwit explained that many times he has tweeted or posted asking people “Hey Portland, what’s the best indie theater by you?” or “Should we have a screening at this theater, or is there some place cooler?” which then sparks dialogue about your film screening and builds an engaged audience that will be ready to go when you finally announce your screening.

Check out the full article at PBS.org.

Filming for the second installment of Atlas Shrugged, the film series based on Ayn Rand’s famed 1957 novel, is well underway. The film is set to be released this October, which means long days and intense work on set for the actors and production team this spring.

Duncan Scott, filmmaker of the forthcoming MPI documentary Inside the Mind of Ayn Rand, serves as a screenwriter and creative consultant for the film, and is among those completely immersed in production this April. Twelve to fourteen-hour days are the normal for him–and as a long-time Ayn Rand scholar and enthusiast, he is eager to see this film on the big screen.

Duncan recently sat down with Reason‘s Brian Doherty to talk about what it was like working with Rand personally on the re-edited and restored version of We the Living, which his company now owns and distributes:

Scott says he never experienced any of Rand’s legendary wrath during their brief period working side by side in the early 1970s, and he questions the conventional wisdom that Rand’s imperious desire for control would have made it impossible to truly finish a filmed Atlas if she were still around to interfere today. “She responded tremendously well to people who were reasonable and rational,” Scott says, “so it would depend on the people she was working with.” Though Rand felt burned to some degree by all her experiences with film–even the 1949 Fountainhead, which she wrote and made sure was shot as she wrote, was ultimately edited against her will and left her feeling dissatisfied with the final result. Rand’s openness to a filmed Atlas, which she tried to write various versions of herself, from feature film to mini-series, would, Scott thinks, “depend on the people who wanted to make the film and her trust in how they would handle the property.”

Scott was brought to this project partially for his decades of experience in the world of Objectivist ideas and Randian film; while he has a long career working as assistant director on non-political films, including Woody Allen’s Zelig and Sidney Lumet’s Deathtrap, he also has kept his hand in the world of libertarian and Objectivist documentary film, and is working on a huge Rand documentary now as well.

The “huge Rand documentary,” MPI film Inside the Mind of Ayn Rand, will be the first ever feature-length film that explores the full range of Rand’s ideas. The film will lay out the tumultuous events of Rand’s life while exploring her ideas and their relevance to the fundamental issues facing America today.

Learn more about Inside the Mind of Ayn Rand and watch the teaser video for the film at MovingPictureInstitute.org.

This week, the New York Post featured MPI fellow Brian Iglesias, praising his entrepreneurial efforts and success in filmmaking.

As a Marine captain-turned-filmmaker, Brian Iglesias, 34, relies on a veritable “laundry list” of military skills to run his production company, Veterans Expeditionary Media.

But when Iglesias first began looking for a job in film or television, hiring managers failed to see the value of his 14 years of active duty.

[...]
Then, after nearly a year of futile job searching, Iglesias was struck with the realization that he would have to “create my own opportunity.”

“The door wasn’t opening, so I figured I’d knock it off its hinges and do it myself,” he says.

For Iglesias, this meant enrolling in Syracuse University’s Entrepreneur Bootcamp for Veterans for a crash-course in business ownership, and teaming up with Anton Sattler, a fellow Marine infantry officer and aspiring filmmaker.

Together, the duo decided that Iglesias’ idea to make a documentary about the Chosin Reservoir Campaign — a seminal Korean War battle — had real potential.

“Every Marine is told about this battle,” says Iglesias. “It’s legendary. So we thought, a lot of these guys are still alive. Let’s get their stories. Let’s capture it.”

Not a month later, Iglesias and Sattler had cashed in their savings and embarked on an eight-month journey around the country to interview 128 of the battle’s veterans. Along the way, they relied on the kindness of fellow vets, friends and strangers for warm meals, couches to crash on and even cash donations.

According to Iglesias, “people believed in what we were doing” — so much so that he and Sattler decided to form their production company around their first project. “We knew that we were going to continue to do this past this film.”

But the first order of business was several months of editing and post-production work in preparation for premiering their finished product, “Chosin,” at the 2010 GI Film Festival. The film ended up selling out its first night and winning best documentary, and has since been screened all over the country and optioned for a Hollywood feature.

“We kind of hit gold,” Iglesias says. “Our mission was to celebrate these heroes, and we did that. It was pretty rewarding.”

Bolstered by their initial success, Iglesias and Sattler have gone on to produce several commercial spots for veterans organizations and a trio of small-budget narrative films, and they recently started work on a military-themed animated movie. This past year, they also produced the pre-taped content for the NYC Veteran’s Day Parade and assisted with the live broadcast.

[...]
Now, as the company continues to grow and is finally turning a profit, Iglesias finds himself busier than ever, with a balance of script writing, industry networking and financing. But if the workload is substantial, so are the rewards.

“As an infantry officer with a film degree, my qualifications were pretty narrow,” he says. “But I answered that call. The best part about it is that I am what I’m supposed to be.”

MPI fellow Anthony Fisher was recently on the San Francisco-based KKSF-AM radio show, hosted by Bob Zadek, to talk about the Occupy Wall Street movement from a libertarian perspective.

Zadek, an ardent advocate of liberty himself, praises Fisher’s work in film and his contributions to Reason.tv.

Listen to the segment here.