Them Bönes

[marc]

Here's a first attempt on a logline:

-- Richard, religious zealot and recreational treasure hunter and his posse of august adventurers trail the tracks of one of his supposedly
saint ancestors in search of divine accolade, when they are joined by Hubertus, an aristocratic skeleton coalescing with Beelzebub who was
murdered by this very man. --

What do ye say?

[opalmquist]

Total noob so take it for what it's worth:

Lots of cool elements at play here. That said, the alliteration ('august adventurers' 'trail the track' 'supposedly saint') gets me thinking about clever writing rather than focusing on the logline, for me it was a distraction.

Also -- don't know exactly what to expect from the story. Is Richard the one who murdered Hubertus? Or he murdered Beelzebub? So Hubertus wants to kill Richard? How does the divine accolade motivate/tie it all together?

Just my initial impressions...

-O

[marc]

Hubertus was murdered by the ancestor. That was one of the things I knew would be confusing. So thanks for confirming that.

The divine accolade is something Richards strives for. He recognizes that his ancestor was a "St." and he wants to get prove that he himself is of "divine" blood.

ha, ha, the alliteration was totally accidental but I kept it because it read kinda classy (oops, another one).

Still working on where the tone is going to go. It's sort of a mixture of adventure, comedy, ghost-story and action.

Thanks a lot for the input.

[mscherer]

Marc,

First, way too wordy. Second, way too obtuse. For example: ‘…in search of divine accolade’. What the hell is that? Do you honestly think a Hollywood producer will understand what you are talking about? To make matters worse you write, ‘…an aristocratic skeleton coalescing with Beelzebub’. Huh?

Simplify. Simplify. Simplify.

And what are the stakes? What happens to these ‘august adventurers’ if they don’t succeed? No stakes – no story.

Screenwriting is not literature (except in some very, very rare cases) so lose the flowery prose, simplify the logline, find your stakes.

One man's opinion -- mileage may vary -- batteries not included.

[marc]

I realize that stakes must be included in a logline.

When you have the story in your head you see these stakes and I thought of a walking, talking dead person who is brought to life through the lord of the flies might bear a grudge against a descendant of his murderer.

I realize that it is hard to convey what you mean in a short logline when other people don't know exactly what you have in mind.

Problem is, I'm still trying to get all parts of this together and this basically was just an idea and a short story-layout I made. No flesh on the bones, yet, so to speak. (and Hollywood producers are the last thing I have in mind, right now)

I just wanted to see if I can come up with a logline that would somehow get the idea across. Doesn't seem to work. I will try and outline the story a little further and then produce a new logline which is simpler.

Thanks for the criticism.

[mscherer]

Marc,

I wasn't trying to be mean, just reading your logline as if I were a producer. While reading, those were the thoughts that popped into my head... ie: 'What the hell is that?'.

I think one of the keys to insuring your logline works is to read it aloud. Listen to how it sounds. If it sounds clunky or obtuse, simplify and rewrite and reread. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

Keep Writing!