Logliner
Posted: 2017-08-21T19:53:15+10:00 In:

A broke bounty hunter with schizophrenia and down to his final pill, must catch an elusive fugitive in extremely isolated territory before his hallucinations kick in.

A broke bounty hunter with schizophrenia and down to his final pill, must catch an elusive fugitive in extremely isolated territory before his hallucinations kick in.
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    6 Reviews

    1. Singularity

      This sounds like it has interesting elements, but they’re hard to pick out from the logline.

      Why not use a big event as the inciting incident and have the bounty hunter stranded in the wilderness with the killer, this way, his running out of pills is clearly related to the plot.

      For example:
      After a bounty hunter with schizophrenia crashes in the wilderness, a murderous fugitive in his custody runs away, he must now re capture the killer in order to save his own life before his medication runs out.

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    2. Singularity

      Just saying your logline get’s us right up to the point where the story will begin, then stops. Normally that would be the point where a logline would begin.

      Here would be an example of a logline that would start with the inciting incident then move forward (While still acknowledging the set-up)
      ——
      “When a serial killer abducts the mayor’s daughter, a former police officer with schizophrenia and only one pill left, must enter the world of rave culture to track down the murderer if he is to repay the life debt he owes the mayor from when they were partners on the force”?
      —–

      Obviously this is just an example and your logline would be different.

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    3. Singularity

      You spend a lot of this on backstory and the set up which makes me worried about the forward story.

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    4. Singularity

      I think you have the kernel of a very interesting predicament, a schizophrenic who must apprehend a criminal before his meds run out (IOW: a ticking clock).

      I do have a credibility issue with his being able to function as a professional bounty hunter after being cut from the force after his schizophrenia kicked in. ?If he can’t function as a cop, how can he function as a bounty hunter? ?Being a bounty hunter entails being able to competently exercise the ?same cognitive skill set of ?a cop.

      Also, I think afflicting him with alcoholism is an unnecessary pile on. ?I suggest it would be better to focus one character vulnerability; schizophrenia by itself creates more than sufficient opportunities for dramatic conflict and complications.

      fwiw

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    5. Uberwriter

      Benny,

      The first problem that leaps out at me is that the time bomb of “before his hallucinations kick in” is not strong enough. It sounds to me like he should get that medically taken care of before he attempts to catch murderers.

      While healthcare and paying for meds is one of the top concerns of people across the world, and easily identified with, I’m not sure if including that in the logline is worth the space. People want to know about the protag vs the antag and what must be overcome/resisted.

      Now, if he needed to catch a killer for bounty payment to have a surgical procedure before… ?

      Now you got something solid to work with.

      I would focus on the “sick” protag vs whatever is special about the antag that this guy is qualified to deal with.

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    6. Logliner

      I know that stakes may not seem high but I’m struggling to fit in to my already packed logline the outcomes of him being unmedicated. There’s a dark secret he carries and one he convinces himself was just a hallucination the last time he went for a while unmedicated. He wasn’t hallucinating. This is unravelled throughout.

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