Romantic-Comedy
savinh0Samurai
After an unsuccessful journalist from Greece, who lives at subsistence level, and his childhood sweetheart from Germany meet again, he wants to prove to her that their relationship can work, and that he can bring structure in his chaotic life before she carries back to her job as a flight attendant.
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The wording and structure are confusing in this logline. Better to use less words and mention less detail about the characters backgrounds and describe the action and goals clearly.
The character description of the MC is confusing in its relation to the plot.
How does being an “…unsuccessful journalist…” or being from Greece relate to him wanting and not having the girl? And what does “…subsistence level?” mean?
This is a boy meets girl story and as with all boy meets girl stories what makes them interesting is not the setting or period rather what keeps the boy and girl apart. Therefore a logline describing a boy meets girl story needs to have a unique and interesting force that keeps the boy and girl apart. This is what they need to over come to be together and will constitute most of act 2.
The current draft of the logline outlines that his chaotic life is what made her want to stay away from him. This means that it is an internal change that needs to occur in the main character for him to get the girl. This is good as an inner journey goal for the main character to arch around throughout the story but poor as an external journey actions to take for the outer goal.
What external objective goal can you give the MC that will force him to take action (cinematically visible action) in order to get the girl?
Hope this helps.
Subsistence level means that he lives under bad conditions, because he doesn’t earn much money.
He is lying on his conditions and tellls the girl that he lives a good life and is happy with it. Maybe I could put this as a conflict in the story.
Thanks for your feedback!
Could you help me with that logline too? https://loglines.org/a-middle-aged-business-consultant-who-suffers-from-an-identity-crisis-gets-in-contact-with-his-childhood-sweetheart-by-an-older-letter-and-wins-new-courage-to-face-life-and-follow-his-former-passion/
Thank you in advance!
There is a lot going here, and seems the female becoming a flight attendant is to add a timer or ticking clock to the log line, which isn’t a bad idea, but I think it confuses what the main conflict is in the story.
Personally, I would add an element of Irony to the logline by perhaps suggesting he is unsuccessful as a journalist, but when he meets her he discovers she is sitting on top of the biggest story of the year and plans to lead her on to get to the heart of the story, but perhaps when he hands the story into the publisher, he discovers he has 24 hours to stop the story being printed when he comes to realise he has fallen in love with her and his really happiness would not come from his successful career, but from sharing his life with someone.
That is just my thoughts, I think you have a potential story here there are several approaches you could take. Maybe the guy is an old fashioned type and thinks it should the man’s career that takes priority despite the fact she has a great promotion lined up and he’ll have to give up his job to move for her.
Anyways keep plugging away, trust me I have written a few of these myself and still not getting the right even when I think I have.
Thanks a lot Knightrider1984. Your feedback is great! I really appreciate it!
I understand the technical meaning of the words ?subsistence level?? but what I was asking was what it meant in cinematic terms?
How does this look and what direct effect would it have on his actions?
Other wise lying about ones financial condition is not conflict it is an act of desperation. Conflict comes from the creation of two opposing goals in either separate characters or the one.
I still don’t see a clear description of the antagonistic force keeping them apart outside of status specified in his financial and professional position.
For this story no matter the characters best to focus on what is keeping them apart at this stage then create layers in the character and irony in their actions.