The purpose of a logline is to entice the reader with a captivating sentence so they want to invest time in reading the whole story. You might ask why you would need a log line for my book or film script?
In this article, we will talk about what loglines are, show examples of loglines from literature, movies, and TV and how they can be useful no matter what form of creative writing you’ve utilized.
What Is a Logline?
A good logline engages the reader with one or two sentences that are poignant and captivating. They are typically between 30 to 50 words and create a short but effective summary of your story.
If successful, a logline should persuade the reader to finish the story and pick your work over others. Your logline can convey the tone and genre of your story, giving the reader an idea of what they are in for.
Whether you are writing a fast pace thriller or a character filled drama, the logline can clue the reader into what the story is about.
How can a logline be helpful to you as a writer?
A logline is a great way to capture attention. Traditionally, loglines are used as “sales pitches” in the world of movies and television. They can be used to hook potential producers, investors, or studios to turn your script into a production.
Can loglines be useful in other forms of writing besides scripts? The answer is absolutely, yes!
In this current age of social media and online book submissions, a logline can be a very useful marketing tool for a writer to master. Potential publishers can quickly surmise the plot and genre of your story through one captivating sentence.
An additional benefit of learning to write loglines is the practice of distilling your entire story down to its bare bones structure and plot. You will be able to identify the main goal of your characters and understand your story from top to bottom.
You could even consider writing a logline to flesh out your story premise before you write the first word of your story. The ability to create a compelling logline will not only help you to give a great sales pitch to potential investors and publishers, but also help you understand your story more thoroughly.
In the way that a well written story has a structure, loglines also have a set structure. There are four elements you want to include in your logline.
- Lead Character
- Inciting Incident
- Main Conflict
- Character Goal
Here is an example of the structure in action:
“When the Inciting Incident happens to the lead character, he must take action against the main conflict to achieve his goal.”
Let’s take a look at this structure in the form of a logline from a well known film.
- Taken: When the daughter of a retired CIA agent is kidnapped while visiting Paris, the father must go to any lengths to rescue her from traffickers.
The example above shows the father as the lead character or protagonist. The conflict is that the father has to take action and use his skills as a retired CIA agent to go after his daughter. The antagonists in this case are the traffickers who kidnapped the daughter. The father’s goal is to rescue his daughter from becoming a slave.
The “who” of your logline is your main character and their goal. This is who the reader is rooting for and also the point on whom all the stakes are hinged. Clarifying your antagonist’s goal gives your story a point of intrigue for the reader. The inciting incident is also important because it covers the “why” of the logline structure. This sets events into motion and propels the protagonist forward into the central conflict.
The main conflict is the “what” of our logline structure and the main obstacle or difficulty the antagonist faces. This conflict can come from many different sources, including the antagonist of the story, a natural disaster, or a corrupt institution.
The genre can also be implicated through your logline. If you want to write a logline for horror, the mood should be tense with high stakes. A romantic comedy would convey a lighthearted mood and emphasize humor in the goals of the characters.
Here is an example of a well known cult classic in the horror genre that conveys tension in life or death situations.
- Halloween: When a man convicted of killing his family 15 years ago escapes from a mental institution on Halloween, he returns to his hometown in Illinois to continue his reign of terror.
The tone is immediately set through phrases like “convicted of killing” or “reign of terror”. The language and high stakes in this logline make it clear to the reader the genre of the story.
Examples of Loglines From Literature
Although loglines are commonly created for screenplays, they can be very useful in writing literature as well.
Writing a logline helps you to learn your story and convey the most important elements in one sentence. Here are a couple of examples of loglines for some famous works of fiction.
- And then there were none by Agatha Christie: When a group of strangers become stranded on an island by a mysterious host, they are accused of getting away with past crimes and are soon preyed upon by an unknown killer.
This logline presents multiple characters in this case as our main characters. The invitation to the island is the inciting incident. The conflict is that they are stuck on an island while being killed one by one by a hidden killer who is the antagonist.
- Pet Sematary by Stephen King: When a young boy is suddenly killed, a mourning father decides to bury him at an ancient burial ground that can bring back the dead.
In this example of a logline, the inciting incident is first, and then the father who is the main character takes action. The boy is buried in the pet sematary, which yields many conflicts that the father then has to deal with.
- Emma by Jane Austen: In Regency-era England, a wealthy and clever young woman discovers she has a talent for matchmaking and finds there are consequences to meddling in the love lives of others.
The important qualities of the protagonist are described in this logline, giving the reader a picture of the character. The inciting incident is that she discovers she is good at matchmaking those around her, whereas the conflicts begin when she finds out the consequences of her matchmaking.
Movie Loglines
Here are some loglines from famous movies.
- Gladiator: A Roman general who is betrayed and his family killed by a power hungry emperor seeks to avenge his family and survive as a slave forced to fight as a gladiator.
The tagline here shows the Roman general to be the protagonist, the death of his family to be the inciting incident, his enslavement is the conflict, and the emperor is the antagonist.
The main character’s goal is to avenge his family against the emperor. As this is an action film, there are certain adjectives and verbs that convey urgency and tension like “enslavement,” “avenge,” and “survive”.
- Legally Blonde: When a ditzy blonde girl from LA is dumped by her ambitious boyfriend, she decides to go to an Ivy league school to become a lawyer to win him back.
This popular movie is a romantic comedy which is highlighted through lighthearted adjectives like “ditzy”.While seemingly low stakes compared to Gladiator, this logline shows an interesting premise of a character who is taking action to go to an Ivy league school.
This logline is also goal oriented, emphasizing what the blonde girl is willing to do as a result of the inciting incident.
- Alien: When a crew on a space tug called Nostromo discovers an abandoned spaceship on a mysterious planet, their spacecraft is invaded by a lethal otherworldly creature.
This logline describes a famous horror sci-fi film, with high stakes. The crew are the protagonists of the story. The exploration of the abandoned spaceship is the inciting incident that leads to the conflict of the creature’s invasion onto their spacecraft.
From this the reader can infer that the main goal of our characters is survival without giving away if they survived or not.
Best Loglines From TV
These loglines from popular television shows display how to create interest with high and low stake premises.
- Friends: Six adults in their 30’s, living in New York City, rely on friendship to survive the ups and downs of their professional and personal misadventures.
This logline has lower stakes than the example in Gladiator or Alien but still uses active language like “survive” and “rely” to explain how the friendship of the characters will get them through the conflicts of their daily lives.
- Lost: When a plane crashes on an island, the passengers must learn to survive on the island that appears at first to be abandoned.
The stakes are life and death as seen in the active language used in this logline. Notice that the stakes are set high but whether or not they can survive the island is not given away in the logline. It’s important to create interest without giving too much away.
- Breaking Bad: When a middle aged man is diagnosed with lung cancer, he resorts to using his skills as a highschool chemistry teacher to make and sell methamphetamines to support his family.
The stakes are set high in this thrilling TV show with the inciting incident of the man’s diagnosis. The action the protagonist takes against these circumstances shows that his goal is to support his family at whatever cost.
Tips For Writing Loglines
A logline is not a synopsis
While a logline may sound like a synopsis, there are key differences. A synopsis gives a brief overview of the story’s important events in a paragraph or more. A logline does not require as many specific details or information.
It is meant to capture interest rather than inform. Loglines don’t require names for the characters but consist more of the who, the why, or what caused it.
Logline not tagline
Though they have a similar effect and are both condensed forms of your story, they are not the same thing. Taglines are used more as a marketing tool and are shorter than a logline. They contain even less specifics than a logline and are meant to entice and elicit an emotional reaction. The example below shows a famous tagline created for a major motion picture.
- Karate Kid: He taught him the secret to Karate lies in the mind and heart. Not in the hands.
This tagline is designed to draw on the audiences’ emotion because they are reacting to the limited but intriguing information they are given.
No need for names
The main character should be described but does not necessarily need to be named. “Strapping soldier, daring sailor, or precocious girl”, are all examples of describing the character without explicitly saying “Lucy was a precocious girl”. This tells the reader what type of character they are and gets them interested in the premise without excessive details.
Highlight the goal of the character
Your character’s goal is important when writing your logline but also when understanding your story over all. What is driving your character and what are they willing to do to achieve it? The logline should not only include the inciting incident but highlight the motivation of the character and what lengths they will go to meet their goal.
No spoilers
Loglines should enthrall the reader and create interest but not give away key plot twists. You don’t want to reveal the ending or expose twists in your story, only entice the reader to want to know more. Revealing a spoiler in the logline could take away the reader’s interest to finish the story.
Emphasize the stakes
The stakes of your story create attachment for the reader. If it is high stakes then the logline can demonstrate what is at stake for your main character if they should fail.
Highlighting an element of danger or consequence if the conflict of the logline is not overcome creates tension. The reader’s involvement in the story will increase if the logline reflects high stakes that promises an engaging story.
Make the language active
Create your logline using active language. Now that the inciting incident has happened to your protagonist, what will they do about it? What action will they take to overcome the conflict? Your main character’s actions and choices should be what propels the story forward towards the resolution. The action verbs chosen in your logline should suggest activity rather than passivity on the part of the main character.
Ultimately, your logline is a fun and useful tool to refine your story and capture the attention of potential publishers, producers, or any interested party you want to hook in.
A well made logline can help your story stand out and set you apart from the masses. Although a logline may be short, you can convey a thorough understanding of your story structure, genre and premise in just one sentence. Have fun creating loglines for your stories and experimenting with this useful writing tool. Good luck!
