True story of a brilliant professional gambler and the owner of an elegant sporting parlor defending his life against a evil U.S.Marshal, who in a jealous rage is seeking out a personal vendetta in the American south during the late 1880's.

Well awesome, if you liked "Unforgiven" you would probably dig this one as well...thank you for you input I found it most helpful.

Yes, that version is much more improved. I think words like "gambler", outhouse, and "U.S. Marshall" hints enough at the historic time frame where you might not need the year in the logline.

My overriding concern is this: replace "nailed to an outhouse door" with her face being slashed, and "gamblers" with hired guns, and you've got the logline for "Unforgiven".

Perhaps that movie was inspired by the same historic incident. Just a thought...

A prostitute nailed to an outhouse door horrifies a town and sparks a clash of wills between a gambler, his cohorts of famous killers, and a corrupt U.S. Marshal in 1887..any better?

Jimnewman75 is spot-on with his analysis. I also agree that his logline is going toward the right direction, but it is missing something imperative, which was only hinted at in the original logline: the hook.

Use his logline as your new start point, as your second attempt wasn't effective either. You really should not use valuable logline real estate to mention character names unless they are pertinent to the story as a whole.

That being said, it is also more effective for loglines to start out with "When...", or "After...", or "As...".

So, your new logline might look like:

"After a Wild West gambler and a conniving sports parlor owner (expose fixed poker games), they discover that the corruption includes the Marshall and (quite possibly the gambler's father- the judge)!"

I included some elements (possible hooks) that should separate your story from others of the some genre, and even the same topic. For instance, this story is separated from "Maverick" by including the father's possible involvement. More importantly, however, it adds another "hook" and ratchets the conflict another notch. In other words, with that logline, that is a story I'd want to read, and a movie I'd want to watch.

Hope this helps some...

Geno Scala (sharkeatingman)- judge.

Jim please provide your opinion on this "Old west gambler Luke Short conspires against Jim Courtright a corrupt U.S. Marshal in the American south in 1887"... does adding the identity of the historical figures make this any better?

Snip, snip! Let's cut this down to size and try to truncate it into one sentence. Hope this fits your expectations - here we go!

"A professional gambler and an owner of a sporting parlor conspire against a corrupt U.S. Marshal in the American south of 1887."

Without having read your work, I'm only guessing this may fit your storyline (I'm hoping it does).

I don't think it's imperative to write "true story" ... save that for a SUPER line in the script. But it's essential to trim the fat off your logline while keeping the flavor.