In the claustrophobia of a haunted flat, an immature voodoo sorcerer makes a terrible choice when he calls upon his dark gods to seek revenge for a broken heart.

Coolie Bokor

9 reviews

Frugal Writer Penpusher · 41 pts

You are hiding the ball by describing your second act as a "terrible choice". This vague description encompasses the main plot and your entire second act, one half of the story (one hour for a movie).

"Gee Bob, let's go see a movie tonight. How about a cool movie where the sorcerer makes a terrible choice."

Please give us more than a vague reference to your main conflict.

Loglines are a great tool to keep you focused on the big picture. What you described is a vague idea.

If you know what you are writing, state it.

mrliteral Mentor · 2,660 pts

I'm also a supporter of changing male main characters to female unless there's a compelling reason not to, and this looks like a good opportunity to engage more of a female audience.

mrliteral Mentor · 2,660 pts

That's very long, and doesn't provide a clear picture of the story. Also: not sure voodoo is the same as sorcery. But this has to be cleared up and cut down. I'm a big believer in stating four basics, and that's all: protagonist, goal, antagonist, obstacle. All other details can be provided in longer summaries. So it might work more like this:

A heartbroken young man summons voodoo spirits to exact revenge on his ex-girlfriend, but must save himself when they turn against him.

Or:

A heartbroken young man must save his soul when the voodoo spirits he summoned to punish his ex-girlfriend turn against him instead.

Or you could do it this way, though I think it's often stronger to identify the main character immediately: After summoning voodoo spirits to punish his ex-girlfriend, a heartbroken young man must save his soul when they come after him instead.

One thing you'll really want to think about is how to get across the genre. Is it true horror/thriller, or more of a dark comedy? It could go either way, but you want to have the concept made clear by the words you choose.

Ashley Jones 0 pts

How about this for a rewrite?

"A voodoo sorcerer, whose prone to dangerous tantrums, makes a terrible choice when he calls upon his dark gods to seek revenge for a broken heart. He has to survive his claustrophobic home of horror that he's created to win back his soul and save the girl that he's wronged."

Do I change the logline for the page or just write it in this comment box?

FFF Mentor · 7,850 pts

Hello, I don't know if you are familiar with internal/external goals, but from your synospsis it seems to me that you focused too much on the internal goal (accepting the breakup and move on) and not enough about the external goal. Usually the external goal determines what we see in the movie so, expecially in a logline, you should focus on it. In other words, visually, what happens in the movie? Ghosts and monsters attack the hero, how does he react? I assume that the external goal is to stay alive, but precisely what actions he performs?