Let Scriptshadow arm you properly for the coming weekend
As we move into weekend #3 of the Blood and Ink pitches, I want to give you guys more ammo for your entries by reminding you what kinds of loglines generate the most interest. Here are five varieties of loglines you should be pitching if you want to get into the Blood and Ink Showdown.
THE BIG JUICY CONCEPT
The big juicy concept is when you have a concept that is so huge the logline doesn’t matter. “Logline doesn’t matter?? How can that be?” Because all that matters with any movie idea is that the audience a) understands what it’s about and b) wants to see it. Take Jake Barnes’ idea. President of the United States is possessed and needs an exorcism. Note how I don’t have to craft a perfect logline around that for you to understand what the movie is. That’s a big juicy concept. The nice thing about big juicy concepts besides the fact that they’re easy sells is that you don’t have to be a logline expert to pitch them.
This speaks to a wider-ranging conversation about logline construction. The juicier the idea, the less perfect the logline has to be. Conversely, the less juicy the idea, the more perfect the logline has to be. Let’s use the above logline example. Let’s say your movie is not about the president getting possessed but rather the mayor in a small Midwestern town getting possessed circa 1988. I’m going to demand more out of the way that logline is presented than I would The President’s Exorcism.
By the way, I’m not saying the 1988 Exorcism won’t be the better script. But that doesn’t matter yet. All that matters is can you present your story in logline form in a way that will make me want to read the screenplay? And it is possible for the 1988 idea to get reads if your sentence construction is perfect, if the details imply a unique specificity to your story, if the main character sounds interesting. Actually, that’s the perfect segue into our next logline option.
HOW TO WIN THE ‘BASIC BITCH’ LOGLINE GAME (HINT: IT’S CHARACTER)
One of the more frustrating things about being a screenwriter is that most of the stuff we tend to be drawn to doesn’t fit into the high concept paradigm. The stuff we’re really passionate about is often more grounded. And even when those impassioned ideas are bigger, they’re not “president gets exorcised” big. This puts us in a tough predicament when it comes time to write the logline.
For example, let’s say you’re writing an A24 movie. Like Friendship, which recently came out to rent. That movie is about a guy who strikes up a friendship with a weatherman who lives in the neighborhood. The friendship goes sour and he wants his friend back. That’s not a big movie idea. It’s hard to logline that into something compelling, like a lot of A24 movies. I call these loglines “Basic Bitch” loglines because they’re unspectacular movie ideas, the kind you wouldn’t look at twice if they passed you on the street.
So how do you logline these ideas? The only way to do it is to lean into character. If you can make the characters sound interesting, you’ll add significant shine to that basic concept. So, I might logline Friendship this way: “Craig, a lonely suburban husband who has extreme difficulty making friends, has his life turned upside-down when his neighbor, a popular network weatherman, invites him into his life.” Note how this logline is almost entirely character-based. It’s telling you as much about the characters as one has time for in logline form.
That’s how you should approach basic bitch concepts. If there isn’t a juicy hook there, focus on what’s interesting about your characters. And if you can’t focus on characters because you have a basic bitch concept with basic bitch characters, then you shouldn’t have written that script.
IRONY IS YOUR FRIEND YOUNG GRASSHOPPER
The logline that gets the most attention after the big juicy concepts is the ironic logline. And, surprisingly, we’re not seeing a whole lot of loglines featuring irony in the pitches. But boy is it crack for potential readers. So, it’s definitely something you want to consider. All movie execs love clever ideas. It makes them feel smart. And an ironic idea is the best way to achieve this.
A priest who lives a double life is more clever than a priest who is committed to the cloth. A therapist who’s on the verge of becoming crazy is more clever than a schoolteacher on the verge of becoming crazy. An influencer with 20 million followers is more interesting if she’s deftly shy in her day to day life than if she’s super outgoing.
Although the best ironic premises are built around character, you can build irony around plot as well. In the future, a new city is built so that committing crimes is impossible. It’s billed as the safest city in the world and everyone wants to live there. But then, one day, a string of murders indicates that there’s a serial killer on the loose.
It’s not the greatest idea but it’s a good example of how to build irony into your premise.
BE EFFING UNIQUE
Back in the day, you could be reading some back alley magazine and come across a wild true story about a giant hole that exists in the middle of Antarctica and have the beginnings of a cool movie idea that nobody had heard of before.
But these days, with podcasts and Reddit and social media, all of the unique things that are out there have been exposed a thousand times over. Which makes being unique harder than ever.
But it’s still one of the best ways to separate your logline from the pack. As many as 70% of the loglines that have been pitched so far I’ve rejected because they’ve provided absolutely nothing new. Here’s an example: “A guilt-ridden mother fights to protect her two young children from the disturbed spirit of a murder victim who covets their souls for the afterlife.” Where is the unique element in this idea? It’s not a guilt-ridden mother. It’s not protecting children. A spirit isn’t original. Nor is a murder victim. Nor is coveting souls or the afterlife. Without one single unique element, how do you plan to stand out against a thousand other loglines?
Contrast that with this “strong maybe” that made it. “When a young family’s first night camping in the remote Australian wilderness ends with their car, food, and gear stolen, they are plunged into a nightmare scenario, as they are forced to protect their two teenage children and make their way out of an unforgiving landscape, while staying ahead of the dreaded Kadaitcha, a demonic executioner from Aboriginal folklore, that stalks trespassers and demands blood payment for defiling sacred land.” I’ve never heard of the Kadaitcha in my life. That makes me curious. And that’s what being unique does.
Another strong logline involved moving an entire cemetery. I’d never heard of that before. It’s unique. You should always be pushing to come up with unique ideas so I expect at least one of your ideas this weekend to focus on something truly different.
THAT FRESH ANGLE SMELL
Sometimes it seems like every movie idea has already been done. How can you possibly come up with something new? Here’s how. You find a new ANGLE into an old idea. For example, here’s one of the “yes” loglines that made it directly into the competition: “From bite to bite, we follow the zombie infection as it spreads – each victim’s story unfolding from the moment they’re bitten to when they pass it on.”
We’ve seen a million zombie movies before. But we haven’t seen this angle before. So, when you approach your vampire or werewolf or haunted house or masked killer concept, you can’t just give us another vanilla version of it. You want to take a step back from your idea and see if you’re coming at it too predictably, which is often the case. Is there another way in?
There are many ways to write a movie about a conclave. You can write a world-hopping conspiracy thriller, which I think Dan Brown did in one of his novels. You can follow a journalist who’s trying to break a story about who the next Pope will be. You can write a mystery about how the previous Pope died. Was one of the Cardinals responsible? You can write a dark comedy about a bunch of old men in this church arguing with each other. Or you can write it the way “Conclave” did, following one Cardinal’s journey to try and get the best man for the job elected, only to get pulled into the conversation himself.
What angle you tell your story from can completely change the tenor of the idea. It can be the difference between something sounding dull or exciting, so it’s worth exploring every option before you pick an angle.
All right,
24 hours left before the festivities begin.
Get those loglines ready!
:)
