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After being rejected by his daughter (21), a corrupt NYPD officer (47) decides to turn over a new leaf and initiate a massive undercover operation in order to prove his daughter that he?s changed and make her proud of him.
Agree with CraigDGriffiths. There is nothing that connects the incident with his daughter with his desire to imprison criminals. We don't need to know their ages. It adds nothing to the logline. The fact that it's New York... I'm not sure it's entirely necessary to state this - at least not twice ("Read more
Agree with CraigDGriffiths. There is nothing that connects the incident with his daughter with his desire to imprison criminals.
We don’t need to know their ages. It adds nothing to the logline. The fact that it’s New York… I’m not sure it’s entirely necessary to state this – at least not twice (“NYPD officer” and “across the New York city”). It does go some way to help the reader imagine the story but it’s definitely not essential simply because it could be London, Tokyo, Paris, or LA and the story would remain the same.
How and why was he rejected by his daughter? I think there’s probably a better way to tell us what’s going on with this. It needs to be something that links to the goal as well. Maybe she finds out he’s corrupt and that changes her perception of him and leads to her deciding she doesn’t want him in her life. That at least ties in a bit with his desire to turn over a new leaf. The goal could be to make his daughter proud of him thus connecting the inciting incident and the goal.
You mentioned that the story has multiple goals. In any story there may be multiple things the protagonist is trying to achieve but there should only be one over-arching goal that dictates the lead character’s decisions through the story.
Hope this helps.
See lessWhen a self-described ?monster? is released from prison after 25 years, he must confront his past and modern America on the 2000 mile trip home with his only friend for company; the person who betrayed him. That?s me.
Interesting. I like the basic premise for this. Who is the biography about? Is it autobiographical? Currently, the protagonist is the "monster". The inciting incident and goal are both his however by introducing yourself I'm a bit confused who's telling the story. I don't see any reason why he can'tRead more
Interesting. I like the basic premise for this. Who is the biography about? Is it autobiographical?
Currently, the protagonist is the “monster”. The inciting incident and goal are both his however by introducing yourself I’m a bit confused who’s telling the story. I don’t see any reason why he can’t be the protagonist but told through your eyes I guess… I think it may be difficult to for the audience to relate to both the betrayer and the betrayed though. It’s definitely an interesting idea. I wonder whether you should make yourself the protagonist and write the logline from your POV. There are two great emotional journeys there though for sure and both equally valid but telling it from your perspective as the betrayer might have more weight to it – I’m definitely more intrigued from your emotional journey.
It’s also hard to relate to him as the main character if he’s a “monster”. Who is this guy? Friend? Relative? Lover? What was he in prison for?
The goal is a bit vague at the moment I think. It needs to more visual. Film is a visual medium and I can’t picture what someone “confronting his past” looks like on screen without more details. Confronting modern America is easier – I’m reminded of Brooks and Red in Shawshank Redemption. It’s tricky to know what to suggest, particularly if this is autobiographical, but I think the goal needs to be more objective – like simply getting home in one piece with the person who betrayed him. The emotional journey (in my opinion) is obvious. It’s got a lot less to do with confronting his past and modern America than sitting for 2000 miles with the person who handed him in.
Looking forward to seeing where this one goes. Hope this helps.
See lessWhen a pirate, a princess, and an outlander discover that their crystal necklaces have magical powers, the three women go on an adventure that leads to saving the world from darkness.
Definitely an improvement on the last version. Although, in future, if you could post new versions in the same post as the first (assuming it's still on the first page of the site) it would be useful. It means readers will be able to see the evolution of the idea and the associated comments. IdeallyRead more
Definitely an improvement on the last version. Although, in future, if you could post new versions in the same post as the first (assuming it’s still on the first page of the site) it would be useful. It means readers will be able to see the evolution of the idea and the associated comments.
Ideally, it would be good for one of these characters to be the protagonist. The audience, in order to have an emotional response to the visuals on screen, must empathise with what they are seeing and it’s much easier to do that when you’re only trying to empathise with one character. The protagonist works as the emotional conduit. Most stories that you can think of where there is an ensemble cast still have one leader – Ocean’s 11/Danny Ocean, Stand By Me/Gordy, The Goonies/Mikey, etc.
Why a pirate, princess and outlander? Why not a peasant, a knight and a alchemist? My point is, how you label the character must tell us something about the story. The beauty of going for a single protagonist is it frees up some words for you to give us a characteristic that’ll help us understand who it is we’re following and why.
The adventure they go on shouldn’t lead to the saving the world from darkness – this make it sound accidental. They need to proactively set out to achieve this – the PROtagonist(s) must be PROactive. This is their goal. The goal should also be closely related to the inciting incident – in this case the discovery of magical necklaces. I feel like we need to understand the connection to these necklaces and how they’ll help save the world.
As Richiev has done, give us an antagonist. Who are they working against? Who is trying to cover the world in darkness? More importantly (for a 3 dimensional antagonist) why are they doing this? A good exercise is writing a logline from the antagonist’s POV too to ensure they have a valid and relatable(ish) reason for doing it. Thanos is a perfect example of this! He has a surprisingly rational motive and whilst it’s brutal, there’s a logic to it that’s hard to deny.
Hope this helps.
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