The Handyman
vogajonesPenpusher
When rape victim Jasmina James escapes her captor, it sparks a series of events that lead to the arrest of America’s most notorious black serial killer, Anthony Sowell.? Inspired by true events.
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Best you read through the Training tab on the top bar to learn the basics of logline construction.
You should describe a significant event in the life of a flawed protagonist who is motivated to achieve a goal. What you described in this logline is a situation involving many characters, but not a single goal driven plot – the primary function of a logline.
Secondly no need for the character names unless they are widely recognised such as; Jesus, Gandhi or Superman.
To help you focus your next draft, what did the rape victim do after escaping?
What did she want? Was it revenge? To have the attacker arrested? In specific terms, what was her goal as a result of the rape?
Agree with Nir Shelter.
And who is the protagonist? ?The ?serial killer? ?The victim who escapes? ?Or someone else not mentioned in the logline, say a detective who puts the clues together and apprehends the killer?
Another thing to get this down to a more clear and concise size for a logline is to drop the “true story” line. That’s something you would add to a pitch or the beginning of a screenplay as a disclosure but for a logline we just want to know who the protagonist is and the core story.
Also, is it based off of a book? Article? You need to be careful of rights issues when writing things based off of something else. Hope this helps.
“Based upon a true story” or “inspired by a true story” can help, may even be necessary, when the logline is about a character, a story that seems too improbable, too absurd to be credible. ?(I’m using it in a logline for current script in progress.) ?However, I don’t see how it adds anything to this version of the logline.
And I am wary about describing him as “America’s most notorious black serial killer”. ?I suggest referring to him as one of America’s most notorious serial killers and let it go at that. ?The script (and logline) should ?be strong enough to stand on the legs of the character and the story. ?His race should be incidental.
fwiw
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