The story of the radical writer John Reed, eye-witness to the Russian revolution, the only American to be buried in the Kremlin.

“Reds” (1981), the movie that converted me into thinking in terms of two loglines for writing scripts, one for plotting, one for pitching.

The logline I posted is the pitch. It focuses on the hook, not the plot. It sells the sizzle, not the steak.

>>>the only American to be buried in the Kremlin.

That’s the hook. That?s what got Warren Beatty’s attention, got him interested in the life of the controversial American socialist writer, John Reed. How did it happen that an American? came to be honored with a burial plot in the Kremlin?

It was also the hook that got Beatty meetings with power players, that got them to read the script. (Okay, that and Beatty’s considerable charm and box office clout at the time.)

But the marketing pitch didn’t form a road map for writing the script; it didn’t delineate a plot. What might be a plot logline for the script of “Reds”? Well, here’s my take on a logline for the plot which is framed in terms of the relationship:

After two radicals fall in love, they struggle to work out a stable relationship while swept up in the carnage of the Great War and the chaos of the Russian Revolution.

I know, I know. That logline of the plot has you all primed and pumped to immediately stream the movie or buy the DVD.

As if.

But folks that’s how Warren Beatty plotted the script. (With an assist for historical accuracy and ideological cant from Trevor Griffiths.) His framework was the tension in the relationship between the two main characters.

The dramatic question to be (eventually) answered is raised in the 18th minute of the film. John Reed (played by Warren Beatty) persuades Louise Bryant (played by Diane Keaton) to dump her husband and run away with him to New York. Before committing, Louise asks, “What as? Your lover? Your mistress? Your concubine? What as?”

For the next three hours, the two characters argue and fight (literally) to answer that question. They fall in and out of love. They make up and break up. They marry and split up.

Why? Because history keeps throwing wedge issues that divide and separate the lovers: labor agitation, world war, revolution.

Louise finally arrives at the answer to the dramatic question in the last 6 minutes of the film.

For me, ?Reds? was an informative case study of how to tell a sprawling story (labor strife in America, war and revolution in Europe) about an unpopular subject (socialism)? with characters struggling for an objective goal most Americans would not root for (topple capitalism), characters who ultimately are losers, on the wrong side of history, who come to pathetic ends, who fade into obscurity.

But that?s a topic for another venue.

Wind:

Good question.? I suggest that loglines posted? as “Examples” are a special case,? an exception to the general rule that all? loglines should be posted based upon? “The Formula”.? ?Loglines in this category are not in the same class as loglines for spec scripts.? “Examples” loglines? are for scripts that are done deals, that have already been made into movies.? I think the more important factor to consider in writing loglines for done deals is the story hook.? What was the unique selling point, the “plus factor” that got the script read and sold, the movie made?

It may be that one version of a logline can do both? jobs.? But I have come to the conclusion based upon my own analysis of loglines? (over 850 to date), that is not always the case.

Such was not the case with “Reds”.? The? hook that got Warren Beatty interested in John Reed, the hook he used to pitch the project was that? the main character, an American radical, was buried in the Kremlin.

And “Reds” is a special case of the special case.? Only someone with Warren Beatty’s charm,? network (he was on a first name basis with all the power players) and star status could have gotten the? script sold, the movie made. An aspiring wanna writer with no agent,? zero industry contacts could not have done it.? Don’t try this at home!