Categories: Drama
MC: young police officer
MC flaw: scared of confrontation
Action: Violence without police
Goal: protect his family
Try answering the questions above again using no more than three?words to answer each, other wise you still don't have the necessary components for a story yet.
MC ? white desk cop
MC flaw ? afraid of confrontation after he wasn't able to stop his black, pregnant wife's gangbanger relatives from beating him years ago & nearly killing him
Inciting incident - a court releases a troublesome activist from jail on behalf of? the mayor - the activist has a long instigating history of violence -? his latest charge was hitting and disarming a police officer during a protest, which led to an accidental shooting of a black teen
Action ? Out of embarrassment & spite of the mayor's increasing anti-cop rhetoric, the cop who was hit/disarmed & injured the black teen and ultimately suspended, successfully persuades the majority of the force to call in sick at an upcoming rally that's promised to be a "day of rage" by local protesters
The latest draft of the logline is confusing - the first clause doesn't logically connect to the second one.
Either the street cops are absent as a result of the mayor calling them off or because of they all call in sick, but you can't have both as we don't know which is the inciting incident.
Secondly the wording is throwing me off. They can't retaliate for something that hash't happened yet, and this also comes across as a separate action taken by characters other than the MC.
Lastly what is the desk cop's goal specifically? Right now it reads as if he wants his mates back at work, but that's too vague. Is there a particular person he wants to come to work for a particular reason?
Even then is the whole film going to be about him calling and texting his work mates? Not to mention that the stakes are not clear, what's the worst that will happen if most of the other cops don't show up?
In leu of all the above questions I think the concept is unclear, lets try and break it down to it's bare components:
MC - desk cop
MC flaw - ?
Inciting incident - ?
Action - ?
Goal - ?
If you reply back with answers to the question marks we will be able to construct a logline together.
After a small-town?mayor orders his police force to "stand down" during a protest that ends violently, a desk cop attempts to prevent most of the department from calling in "sick" out of retaliation for another upcoming demonstration rally.
This seems very topical, could you not go down the root of basing it more in fact?
As a logline itself, who is the protagonist? The popular suspended cop? It seems so and that the desk cop is the antagonist but I get the feeling it' the other way around because if it isn't that's messed up haha.
This seems very topical, could you not go down the root of basing it more in fact?
As a logline itself, who is the protagonist? The popular suspended cop? It seems so and that the desk cop is the antagonist but I get the feeling it' the other way around because if it isn't that's messed up haha.
I like it, but can't see how the suspension links to his story. Can you supply some connective tissue. Otherwise here's my version.
A small town desk cop become a local hero when every other cop calls in with the flu.
Is there a big event that coincides?
If the story is about the desk police officer taking to the street, then the background explanation of how and why the other officer was suspended is irrelevant.
Your inciting incident is all the police officers being absent from work, and you need to describe the event that led to this happening very briefly.
Additionally I don't find it believable that an entire police department would call in sick or not show up for work - it just doesn't make any sense. You need to build a plot devise that is clear and logical to get all the of the street officers away from work. I think DPG might be able to?shed some light on potential scenarios...
This idea strikes me as really cool on the one hand, but on the other, I could see you getting into a lot of trouble with it, especially because this reads more like a comedy to me than a drama. It'd depend on how it was handled, I suppose.
