Crafting a great logline for your screenplay is important for many reasons. It can be used as a guideline that helps you build the foundation of your story and it can be used as a sale’s pitch to hook potential buyers or cast and crew members you’re trying to attach to your project. So let’s go over how to write a log line for film.
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First, let’s go over what a log line is and when you should write it. A log line is a brief synopsis of what your story is about while also stating the central conflict and defining the protagonist.
Loglines typically should be written before you write your screenplay to help you focus on what your story is about and really drill down to the core. Also note that a logline isn’t a tagline. Taglines are often the one line marketing slogans you see on film posters that tease excitement but don’t really unfold the story.
So, how do you write a logline? Let’s get into the basic logline formula so you can really make yours shine. The basic formula looks something like this: Inciting Incident + Character + Objective + Stakes.
Another way to think about it is breaking it down into more of a sentence like this: When (inciting incident) happens, a (character) must do (objective) before (stakes).
Now note that you can move these parts around, so for example you could swap where Character + Inciting Incident fall, but this gives you the basic building blocks that every logline needs. It’s up to you to be creative in how you arrange them.
Now a couple of tips here, avoid using character names and instead opt for descriptions. For example, a high school dropout, or a timid bus driver, or a deaf opera singer. Doing this tells the reader exactly who your main character is in a much stronger way than just a name. After all, it doesn’t matter if the opera singer is named Cindy or Roy, the important part here is that they are deaf opera singer.
Also, don’t make it too long. It should be one scentenance but that doesn’t mean you want a run on sentence that just doesn’t know when to quit because you just can’t seem to bring yourself to trim it down or hit that period. Try to keep it to under 50 words and as succinct as possible.
Next, you’ve probably heard the phrase “fish out of water” before, and as any good screenwriter will tell you, irony = drama in a story. In screenplays this is often referred to as dramatic irony and it can help you build the central conflict for your protagonist.
The more ironic the situation they find themselves in, the greater the obstacles they have to overcome which always makes for a great story. So if you can work irony into your logline you’re really setting yourself up for success when it comes to writing your screenplay. Note that this isn’t a requirement, but rather a great bonus.
So there you have it! Now you know how to write a log line for a screenplay!
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