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Heyzeus85Penpusher
A journalist who escaped an abusive religious cult plans to sneak back in and get his younger brother out, but his plan goes awry when the cult leader’s prophecies come true and all current members receive supernatural powers.
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I believe that the most important part of a logline is the story hook, the element that grabs attention, arouses curiusity, makes people want to read the script. This logline buries the story hook when it should lead with it.
The plot, the really interesting part, begins: “when the prophecies come true and all current members receive supernatural powers.”
Unfortunately, the logline doesn’t specify whether the powers are beneficial or harmful. If cult members start healing the sick, raising the dead, what’s the problem? Isn’t that a good thing?
Well, the logline is tagged as a horror flick so I guess it’s safe to assume the powers aren’t a good thing.? Okay,? in what way? What specific threat do they pose? And what can the journalist, a mere mortal, do about it? What can anyone do about it?
As a result of this fulfillment of prophecy, what becomes the journalist’s objective goal?
I like this idea but, as Scott said, it’s a little wordy.
I think the massive escalation in the difficulty of the goal (at the midpoint?) is interesting and a nice take on the “religious cult” trope.
I would consider running this through the logline generator to trim it down and focus on how the inciting incident and the goal are connected. To me, the I.I. is probably the moment he discovers that his brother is part of the cult. I don’t think the journalist should have already escaped from the cult – we know that it’s possible if he’s done it already. I think he should be investigating strange disappearances that have been linked to the cult and he discovers his brother has been kidnapped. This makes his goal to escape with his brother perfectly logical but also very logically sets up his reason for being there in the first place. The first questions I had when I read the logline was “why was the journalist in the cult to start with and why didn’t he take his brother the first time he escaped?”.
The thing I like about this is that there’s a great escalation in the difficulty of his goal. First, it’s simply to find out what the cult is doing – as a journalist it’s his job. Second, when he discovers his brother’s been kidnapped, it’s escape with his brother. Then, finally, it’s escape with his brother against supernatural beings.
I kinda feel like this is more action/adventure than horror. It’s a little bit Temple of Doom like. There’s nothing that I find particularly scary and I can imagine a lot of action scenes but that’s perhaps just me.
You could set this logline up with a MPR – it could just start with him investigating the disappearance of local kids that’s been linked to the cult. But when he discovers his brother has been taken, it’s not about the truth, it’s about getting him out alive.
Keep working on it. I’m intrigued to see where it goes.
The premise seems fun, but, I think my main issue is that it’s wordy.? This might not be the best phrasing, but it still seems to capture the hook:
A journalist returns to free his younger brother from an abusive cult with supernatural powers.
You have a lot of extra words specifying when and how those superpowers manifest, but it doesn’t seem important enough.