When two criminal old friends become enemies and seek advice, a clever gangster boss must hide himself to make them end each other, just to learn that time heals all wounds.

Hi Henrik S,

First, I assume that a word is missing here: “… to make them end each other _ …, ” but I’ll try to give you my take here anyway, even if the syntax of the sentence makes it hard to interpret.

The logline presented ends with a character arc, a development of our hero, which is very unclear who that is. Could be any of the three characters the way I read it, because from the sentence syntax, I can’t tell who you mean when you write “… just to learn that time heals all wounds.” A character arc in general is not part of a logline. If you have an easier time imagining charcter developemnt before a story emerges, fine. Keep in mind though, the character arc, or hero’s journey will only be completed because he’s trying to achieve a specific goal and must face antagonism which he is not capable of overcoming with his current psychological resources. In other words, what external conlfict will force our hero to understand that time heals all wounds? If he doesn’t struggle, he won’t get it. When humans change, they change out of necessity more often than out of sheer will, that is the underpinning of any chracter developement. They are changed by their experience more often than their willforce.

Keeping all this in mind, we need a specific goal for the hero to vie for, as well as tangible consqsequences shoudl he fail to do so, or in other terms, stakes. Also, we need antagonism the hero must overcome to achieve said goal. A useful logline formula her would be, “Protagonist + Struggle with Antagonist + Death Stakes.” It’s one of many, but contains all the vital ingredients for the major conflict in the idea and will fuel the entire narrative.

Without the missing parts and the correct syntax for the logline it’s almost impossible to craft some suggestion.

Cheers,
BeeZeeBee