How To Write a Logline

How To Write a Logline This week we're going to be answering a really great question: how do you write a logline? But before we start talking about how to write a logline, I think it's pretty important to define what it actually is.  Sure, we all technically know what a logline is. It's a short sentence that tells what a movie is about. We see crappy ones all the time on Netflix and Amazon. They're not usually very descriptive. They don't usually make you really feel anything. So is that the kind of logline you want to write? If you browse the internet, there are 50,000 different formulas where people tell you this is how to write a logline, as if there was a simple rule that you simply had to follow that would make a one-size-fits-all logline that would work for any story.  You're probably not surprised that I disagree with this idea.  If you want to learn how to write a logline, you first have to truly understand what a logline is, and that begins with understanding what a logline does.  First, a quick bit of history, where do loglines come from?  Back in the days before we had Netflix and Amazon and Hulu and DVRs and all this fancy stuff that we have now, we had this crazy thing called television. In order to figure out what was happening on television, there was basically one resource: a magazine called TV Guide. People would pick up TV Guide, “let's see what's on at eight o'clock tonight on CBS.” They would look it up and voila! There's the name of some movie that had been in the theater a long time ago.  But having just a title wasn’t enough. After all, this movie was in the theater a long time ago. You might have completely forgotten what it was. So underneath the title, there would be a short description called a logline. It was called that because the studios would send the line to be logged at TV Guide.  So, it's important to understand that loglines started as a marketing tool, not as a writing tool. They're often now marketed the opposite way.  So many screenwriters are taught that they must start with a logline and that only once they have their loglines perfected can they actually start to write the script. As if the movie should be created to fit the marketing materials, instead of the other way around. But real screenwriting isn’t so simple. If you happen to have a great logline from the very start, there’s nothing wrong with using it.  If the screenwriting gods are kind… let’s say you're in the shower rub a-dub-dubbing, and the heavens open up and suddenly the perfect logline comes down to you, please accept it! “Thank you, screenwriting gods. I will take this beautiful logline and I will do my best to execute it.”  However, a great screenplay doesn't always come so linearly, in a nice little one-sentence logline all wrapped up in a bow.  Sometimes figuring out how to write the perfect logline can be elusive, especially at the beginning. Sometimes that great idea for a screenplay doesn’t instantly materialize as a perfect logline. Sometimes it comes as a character you can’t stop thinking about. Sometimes it comes as a world you want to explore. Sometimes it comes in a line of dialogue. Sometimes it comes as a question that you don't know the answer to. Sometimes it comes as a reaction to watching something else.  So, if the screenwriting gods are not kind enough to give you a perfect one, it's important to remember that no great higher power came down and decreed, “You must have a logline before you write a screenplay.” In fact, this is a marketing tool that used to get done after the movie was already completed, after it was done and over, after it had already been made. It was a marketing technique to be logged with TV Guide.  Okay, so now that we know the facts,