Tabloid journalist David Cross discovers a secret military base guarding a mysterious mansion — claimed to be associated with the disappearances of several community members, in the woods of a rural Indiana town and is forced to take refuge inside.

We are now on the word hunt ? we want to shoot down any extra word to get down from 40 to 30.

The names ? they are not important for logline. Instead of Tabloid journalist David cross, lets do it just Tabloid journalist?. And rural Indiana town ? cross out Indiana. How important is word tabloid? And why tabloid journalist investigates people disappearing? Is it connected with the movie content? Or its important for implying some sort of a journey that bored L.A. tabloid journalist smells an opportunity to deliver killer article? Secret military base guarding a mysterious mansion. Lets get it shorter too. Remove one of it: secret or mysterious. I vote for mysterious. Community members could be persons/people.

With all implied, it sounds like this:

Journalist discovers a secret base guarding a mansion in the woods of rural town ? connected with missing people, and its forced to take refuge inside.

Telling the same information I went down to 26,, which give you some room to enhance elements you consider important, as perhaps can be tabloid?, mysterious? or even mention an antagonist which will reinforce the structure of your movie, or mentioning a path your hero have to take, or something what will change him on his way.

With that there could be several versions:

Antagonist:
Journalist discovers a secret base guarding a mansion in the woods of rural town ? connected with missing people, and its forced by mercenaries to take refuge inside.

Journalist discovers a secret base guarding a mansion in the woods of rural town ? connected with missing people, and after forced refuge inside he is chased by ghosts!

Inner path:
Bored tabloid journalist discovers a secret base guarding a mansion in the woods of rural town ? connected with missing people, and in pursue of his career he takes refuge inside.