Five screenwriting tips

By Ian Masters

If you google “how to write a logline”, no doubt you’ll hit on various diagrams, paradigms and formulas which promise to be the miracle cure for that stonking screenwriting headache which plagues every writer. Writing a succinct one-liner that will hook an agent or exec – and garner that all-important read request – is rarely easy or stress-free.

However, after working with over 40 writers in Scriptfella Talent Logline Lab, I am now convinced that following well-trodden logline writing formulas can actually harm a writer’s chance of getting reads -- and kill off a project.

Here are the five key takeaways I learned during the Scriptfella Talent Logline Lab.

Pitch the drug of the movie

One of the hardest parts of writing a logline is removing yourself from the position of the writer and putting yourself in the position of the reader; jettisoning all the stuff that you know is great in the script and just asking: what will make a reader pause with curiosity?

The logline needs to pitch the “drug” of the show – its most interesting element. It doesn’t need to tell the story, if the most interesting thing that will get an exec to pause and consider is something smaller – a character, a dilemma, an unlikely pairing of characters, a situation, a world, a conflict.

Find the drug of the story and build your logline around that element. The most interesting parts in loglines are often buried in surrounding stuff that is more prosaic. Lead with the story narcotic.

Sometimes titles feel “vanilla” compared to the concept in the logline – make your title work for your logline and your movie.

Partner up that title and logline

Think about the combination of your title and logline and how they work in tandem to engage any potential reader. If the title indicates the world, then you don’t need to repeat it in the logline. And ask yourself: does the title help or hinder the story and the logline? Sometimes titles feel “vanilla” compared to the concept in the logline – make your title work for your logline and your movie.

Demo the story’s potential

Setting up the possibilities of where the story could go is often more interesting and arresting than summarising the actual story. The weakest loglines try to outline the plot, normally with awkward, long and convoluted sentences which then have the reverse effect – they make a reader question whether the writer genuinely has a love of the written word.

Make your story stand out

Loglines that stand out have one of the following:

An original set-up or problem. The character in that situation is less important than the situation itself. These loglines make us ask ourselves: how will the character get out of this unusual predicament?

An original character or relationship in a more ordinary set-up. With these loglines, we want to see this situation reveal more about this unusual character.

An original arena or precinct. Here we feel we haven’t seen this world on screen, and ask what is there to be taken away from a story set in this world.

Agents and movie execs want to find undiscovered screenwriting gems.

Don’t fluff your logline

Words to avoid in loglines:

Jargon that doesn’t arouse curiosity.

Long, run-on sentences that leave a reader scratching their head to actually unpack.

Vanilla phrasing – the kind of phrase that doesn’t really contribute anything arresting, but exists just to “round out” the logline. For instance: “in a cat and mouse chase”, “battle/fight to the death”, “all hell breaks loose”.

Agents and movie execs want to find undiscovered screenwriting gems. Give them a logline that compels them to sit up and demand to read your script.

Ian Masters

Ian Masters is an award-winning scriptwriter who has worked across Africa and Asia for the past two decades. He is now based out of the UK with his writing partner, Jon Smith.

You can connect with Ian on LinkedIn, contact him through his agent or his website, and find out more about his work here.

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How to write a banging logline