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  1. Introduction
  2. How Do You Write a Logline?
    1. Establish Your Main Character (Or Characters)
    2. Set the Setting
    3. State the Big Conflict
    4. Emphasize the Stakes
    5. Include the Twist
    6. Keep It Short
    7. Apply Vivid Language
    8. Revise Your Logline
  3. Hook in a Logline
    1. Hone in on Your Story’s Most Unique Aspect
    2. Build the Intrigue
    3. Make It Fast
    4. Accentuate the Stakes
  4. Familiar Movies and the Loglines
  5. Conclusion
  6. Bonus Advice from Working Screenwriters
  7. Sources

Loglines can play a crucial role in getting a movie read, made, and even seen.

Short and snappy, they’re meant to encapsulate a story while enticing a potential audience member to want to see more.

How Do You Write a Logline?

A logline is so much more than a summary. Through the fewest words possible, your goal with a logline is to provide your potential audience with a vivid mental picture of the look and feel of your story. Your aim in building a logline isn’t so much as to describe your story as it is to have them be engaged in its idea.

Great! So how do we do that?

Establish Your Main Character (Or Characters)

Right from the jump, movies are about characters. So who are yours? Can you give your audience a fast overview of them? Sometimes you’ll need no more than a word or two, but make sure to be clear.

Set the Setting

Context is super important, so you’ll want to make mention of the environment/setting/world and (if necessary) the time period the story goes down in.

State the Big Conflict

Don’t be shy here, because again, you want to be as clear as possible – plainly define your story’s central conflict (and how it relates to your character(s)). Drama is conflict, it’s the essence of all storytelling, and if you’re having difficulty pinpointing exactly what your central conflict is, there may be an issue with your premise (you’ll want to fix this before you move onto your logline).

Emphasize the Stakes

Express what consequences the characters in your story will face should they fail at that big conflict. The more relatable the stakes, the greater your chances of effectively engaging an audience.

Include the Twist

Arguably the most crucial element when it comes to taking hold of an audience, the twist or hook of your story is what should ultimately make it stand out from everything else out there. We’ll dive deeper into this more in a moment.

Keep It Short

This is another crucial aspect of your logline. We can’t express the importance of a logline’s brevity enough. You need to be able to pitch your logline at lightning speed, without rushing through it, keeping it to roughly 25-50 words. Economy of words is key when it comes to loglines. Be very selective and judicious in your descriptive choices. And to that…

Apply Vivid Language

You’ll want to employ strong words that paint lively, striking and distinct pictures. The idea is to bring your scenarios to life with the fewest words possible so analyze your sentences carefully.

Revise Your Logline

Once you feel you’ve got a concise logline that accurately and quickly describes what your movie (or TV show is), read it aloud. Pay attention to the picture being painted and the flow of the words. Does it work together well? The first pass will probably need some work, but once you’ve got something you’re happy with, try it out on some trusted people. Get their feedback. Did they have a clear understanding of what your story is about? Were they engaged? And most importantly, is this a story they’d want to know more about?

Keep working at your logline until it’s perfect. This could be your one chance at getting a potential buyer or audience member to take a look at your creation. Don’t settle on a result. Keep at it until it’s exactly where it needs to be.

Hook in a Logline

So let’s dive deeper into how to build that hook and make a potential audience member take notice…

Hone in on Your Story’s Most Unique Aspect

The whole idea behind creating new content is to give audiences an experience of something they haven’t yet seen. And this is where the uniqueness of your work comes into play. This could be anything from an extraordinary premise to a compelling twist to a wildly memorable character. While it’s important to focus on the uniqueness of your hook, remember the ultimate purpose of it is to intrigue and leave your audience wanting more. And to that point –

Build the Intrigue

You want to make sure your story’s intriguing aspect creates a degree of curiosity in your audience. Typically, some of the best ways to accomplish this are through a high-stakes conflict, an alluring mystery, or a fascinating question. You want to engage with your audience, so weigh your best approach.

Make It Fast

As with the logline itself, brevity is essential to introducing your story’s hook to your audience; you’ll be using fewer words within the given parameters of fewer words for a logline, so make every word count! You only need to entice with the hook, so keeping it brief will not only ideally pique some interest in your audience, it’ll also keep your logline from running too long.

Accentuate the Stakes

Presenting the high stakes and/or consequences of your hook can also help highlight the unique angle of your story and is another great way to engage an audience member in your story. Often, the intensity and urgency involved with high stakes can act as an engaging hook unto themselves.

Familiar Movies and the Loglines

Let’s take a look at some loglines of familiar and successful films. Keep in mind the logline is meant to reflect a film’s tone as well as its content…

  • FORREST GUMP – A simple-minded, kindhearted man enjoys a life of accidental success and fame when all he wants is to love the beautiful woman he has known since they were kids.
  • APOCALYPSE NOW – During the Vietnam War, Captain Willard is sent on a dangerous mission into Cambodia to assassinate a renegade colonel who has set himself up as a god among a local tribe.
  • NAPOLEON DYNAMITE – A listless and alienated teenager decides to help his new friend win the class presidency in their small western high school, all while dealing with his bizarre family life and farm back home.
  • NORTH BY NORTHWEST – When an innocent advertising executive is framed for murder by foreign spies, he must evade the authorities for long enough to uncover the spies’ plot, and save the enigmatic woman who is mixed up with them.
  • PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL – Blacksmith Will Turner teams up with eccentric pirate “Captain” Jack Sparrow to save his love, the governor’s daughter, from Jack’s former pirate allies, who are now undead.
  • SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION – Based on Stephen King’s novella, a pair of imprisoned men bond over a number of years, finding solace and eventual redemption through acts of common decency.
  • STAR WARS A NEW HOPE – An optimistic farm boy joins a rebellion to save a princess from a sinister imperial enforcer — and the galaxy — from a planet-destroying weapon.
  • TOY STORY – A cowboy doll is profoundly threatened and jealous when a new spaceman action figure supplants him as top toy in a boy’s room.
  • ZERO DARK THIRTY – After 9/11, a CIA analyst spends years tracking Osama bin Laden down and must negotiate terrorist bombs, moral dilemmas, and skeptical superiors to find the terrorist leader’s hiding place and persuade the government to attack it.
  • MIDNIGHT COWBOY – A naive man from Texas arrives in New York City to make his fortune as a hustler, but soon strikes up an unlikely friendship with the first scoundrel he falls prey to.
  • CASABLANCA – Set in unoccupied Africa during the early days of World War II, an American expatriate meets a former lover, with unforeseen complications.
  • LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING – A meek hobbit of the Shire and eight companions set out on a journey to Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring and the dark lord Sauron.
  • THE MUMMY – An American serving in the French Foreign Legion on an archaeological dig at the ancient city of Hamunaptra accidentally awakens a Mummy.
  • SHERLOCK HOLMES – Detective Sherlock Holmes and his stalwart partner Watson engage in a battle of wits and brawn with a nemesis whose plot is a threat to all of England.
  • HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE – Rescued from the outrageous neglect of his aunt and uncle, a young boy with a great destiny proves his worth while attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Conclusion

A quintessential selling tool, a good logline captures the essence of your story and engages the audience to the point of wanting more. It should be concise, attention-grabbing, and give a sense of what makes your film unique or compelling.

Bonus Advice from Working Screenwriters

Screenwriter/Director Thomas Bezucha and Kevin Costner
Thomas Bezucha

Thomas Bezucha recently adapted the neo-noir western Let Him Go, from the novel by Larry Watson. Bezucha also directed and produced the film which starred Diane Lane, Kevin Costner, and Lesley Manville for Focus Features.

Bezucha’s debut feature Big Eden, remains the most-honored film in the history of Gay and Lesbian Film Festivals and landed him on Variety’s list of 10 Screenwriters to Watch in 2000.

His follow-up, the hit holiday comedy The Family Stone, featured an ensemble cast led by Diane Keaton and also starred Rachel McAdams, Luke Wilson, Claire Danes, Dermot Mulroney, Craig T. Nelson, and earned Sarah Jessica Parker a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by a Female Lead in a Musical/Comedy in 2006.

Bezucha also directed Selena Gomez in Monte Carlo for 20th Century Fox and wrote the screenplays for The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, directed by Mike Newell and starring Lily James, and The Good House with Sigourney Weaver and Kevin Kline, which will be released in 2021 from Tribeca Films and Amblin Partners.

Prior to his career in film, Bezucha spent a decade in Creative Services at Polo/Ralph Lauren, setting visual direction for store and environment design worldwide.

Screenwriter Justin Malen
Justin Malen

JUSTIN MALEN is a comedy writer who recently wrote the 4-quadrant feature film YES DAY for Netflix, which he sold as a pitch based on the children’s book by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld. The film stars Jennifer Garner and Édgar Ramírez and will be released on March 12, 2021.

Justin previously served as an in-house writer for Illumination, working on several animated projects. Prior to that, he worked on CLIFFORD THE BIG RED DOG for Paramount Pictures and wrote a sequel to BAD TEACHER at Sony. His original spec BASTARDS was produced by Alcon Entertainment and Montecito Pictures. It was directed by Larry Sher and stars Owen Wilson, Ed Helms, J.K. Simmons, and Glenn Close, and was released by Warner Bros as FATHER FIGURES.

Previous to this, Justin co-wrote OFFICE CHRISTMAS PARTY for DreamWorks Studios, with Paramount Pictures releasing. It stars Jennifer Aniston, Olivia Munn, Jason Bateman, T.J. Miller, and Kate McKinnon, and was directed by Will Speck & Josh Gordon and produced by Scott Stuber & Film 360.