Logline Examples: Ultimate List for Filmmakers

Logline Examples

Film and TV logline examples are short paragraphs (25 - 50 words) you find in movie guides that promotes and hook the audience to watch the film. Loglines are also used to pitch a film or tv series to industry professionals for development and financing.

Goal of a Logline

The purpose of a logline is to lay out the key parts of your screenplay that includes the main character, their goal and conflict in an intriguing way, but never gives away the ending.

• pitch to film producers and executives: get your film developed, financed, produced and distributed
• test your concept: get key crew and cast on board
• sell your film: to distributors and streaming platforms
• market your film: to capture the audience

Imagine you have a Producer standing in front of you in an elevator, now pitch your film in 10 seconds. The logline is your core selling point.

Logline Length

How many words in a Logline?

The length of a logline is just one or two clear, short sentences between 35 - 50 words that describes your screenplay main characters, setting, plot and genre to explain what the movie is about.

Logline vs Tagline

The difference between a logline and a tagline is the logline is an informative description you find in tv guides, while the tagline is the slogan up to 5 words that you find on a film poster.

Logline vs Synopsis

The difference between a logline (30 - 50 words) and a synopsis (up to 500 words) a synopsis is the length.  The synopsis a one-page summary of a script that presents a scene-by-scene breakdown of the film storyline. Screenwriter often pitch a film synopsis to producers before writing the full screenplay.

Film Logline Examples

Use the best film logline examples to perfect your logline and highlight the most intriguing aspects of the plot in order to captivate the reader. 

• The Shawshank Redemption | 142 min | Drama:Two imprisoned men bond over a number of years, finding solace and eventual redemption through acts of common decency.
• The Godfather | 175 min | Crime, Drama: The aging patriarch of an organized crime dynasty in postwar New York City transfers control of his clandestine empire to his reluctant youngest son.
• Fight Club | 139 min | Drama : An insomniac office worker and a devil-may-care soap maker form an underground fight club that evolves into much more.
• Edward Scissorhands | 105 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance: An artificial man, who was incompletely constructed and has scissors for hands, leads a solitary life. Then one day, a suburban lady meets him and introduces him to her world.
• Parasite | 132 min | Drama, Thriller: Greed and class discrimination threaten the newly formed symbiotic relationship between the wealthy Park family and the destitute Kim clan.
• The Sixth Sense | 107 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller: A frightened, withdrawn Philadelphia boy who communicates with spirits seeks the help of a disheartened child psychologist.
• Titanic | 194 min | Drama, Romance: A seventeen-year-old aristocrat falls in love with a kind but poor artist aboard the luxurious, ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic
• Seven | 127 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery: Two detectives, a rookie and a veteran, hunt a serial killer who uses the seven deadly sins as his motives
• American Beauty | 122 min | Drama: A sexually frustrated suburban father has a mid-life crisis after becoming infatuated with his daughter's best friend.
• Leon | 110 min | Action, Crime, Drama: 12-year-old Mathilda is reluctantly taken in by Léon, a professional assassin, after her family is murdered. An unusual relationship forms as she becomes his protégée and learns the assassin's trade
• Schindler's List | 195 min | Biography, Drama, History: In German-occupied Poland during World War II, industrialist Oskar Schindler gradually becomes concerned for his Jewish workforce after witnessing their persecution by the Nazis.
• A Quiet Place | 90 min | Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi: In a post-apocalyptic world, a family is forced to live in silence while hiding from monsters with ultra-sensitive hearing.
• Taxi Driver | 114 min | Crime, Drama: A mentally unstable veteran works as a nighttime taxi driver in New York City, where the perceived decadence and sleaze fuels his urge for violent action.
• The Shape of Water | 123 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance: At a top secret research facility in the 1960s, a lonely janitor forms a unique relationship with an amphibious creature that is being held in captivity.
• Braveheart | 178 min | Biography, Drama, History: Scottish warrior William Wallace leads his countrymen in a rebellion to free his homeland from the tyranny of King Edward I of England.
• The Help | 146 min | Drama: An aspiring author during the civil rights movement of the 1960s decides to write a book detailing the African American maids' point of view on the white families for which they work, and the hardships they go through on a daily basis.
• The Game | 129 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller: After a wealthy San Francisco banker is given an opportunity to participate in a mysterious game, his life is turned upside down as he begins to question if it might really be a concealed conspiracy to destroy him.
• Spotlight | 129 min | Biography, Crime, Drama: The true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the massive scandal of child molestation and cover-up within the local Catholic Archdiocese, shaking the entire Catholic Church to its core.
• Trainspotting | 93 min | Drama: Renton, deeply immersed in the Edinburgh drug scene, tries to clean up and get out, despite the allure of the drugs and influence of friends.
• A Beautiful Mind | 135 min | Biography, Drama: After John Nash, a brilliant but asocial mathematician, accepts secret work in cryptography, his life takes a turn for the nightmarish.

Short Film Logline Examples

Use the short film logline examples which are 1 or 2 sentences long to pitch the short film to the audience, making them want to watch a movie.

• Hotel Desire | 38 min | Short, Drama, Romance: A young single mother drops her son of at the bus stop to visit his dad in Paris. After being late for work, she almost gets fired. At the end of her duties she gets into a tricky situation which she handles, with the advice her colleague gave her.
• Terrifier | 20 min | Short, Horror: After witnessing a brutal murder on Halloween night, a young woman becomes the next target of a maniacal entity.
• Kenobi: A Star Wars Story | 19 min | Short, Action, Adventure: After years in hiding, Obi-Wan Kenobi struggles to reconnect with the Force in order to protect Luke Skywalker from Imperial forces.
• The 9th Circle | 11 min | Short, Horror: A woman is abducted by a sinister stranger on Halloween night for a fate worse than death.
• Black Adam Precursor | 2 min | Animation, Short, Fantasy: 5000 years ago, living as a slave under a culture rich with wealth and magic, Teth-Adam gains the powers of Shazam and uses them against his masters.
• Laura Hasn't Slept | 11 min | Short, Horror: Desperate to rid herself of a recurring nightmare, a young woman seeks the help of her therapist.
• Frankenweenie | 29 min | Short, Comedy, Horror: A young boy sets out to revive his dead pet using the monstrous power of science.
• The Strange Thing About the Johnsons | 28 min | Short, Drama, Horror: A dark domestic horror drama about the ties that bind and the ties that really bind.
• The Legend of Sleepy Hollow | 34 min | Animation, Short, Comedy: In a small town, a brewing romantic rivalry with a local tough and a school-teacher culminates in a terrifying ride.
• Mia (XI) | 11 min | Short, Drama: Mia recounts her most intimate confessions, uncensored, in her first approach to a totally new world of domination and submission.
• Father of the Bride Part 3 (ish) | 26 min | Short, Family: Twenty-five years after the second movie's release, the Banks family gathers for a Zoom call and a very special wedding-related announcement.
• Beetlejuice 2 | 3 min | Short, Comedy: Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice is back in this hilarious, side-splitting sequel to the 1988 blockbuster starring Micheal Keaton.
• Six Shooter | 27 min | Short, Comedy, Drama: A black and bloody Irish comedy about a sad train journey where an older man, whose wife has died that morning, encounters a strange and possibly psychotic young oddball.
• Black Panther: Origins | Short, Action, Adventure: The untold story of how T'Challa, the King of Wakanda, rose to power in the isolated, technologically advanced African nation of Wakanda.
• All Too Well: The Short Film | 10 min | Short, Drama, Music: A young man and woman who fall in love, but slowly drift apart in time. Based on Taylor Swift's song 'All Too Well'.
• The Chalk Line | Short, Comedy: Mr. and Mrs. Love, with their young son, are so happy that hubby is usually late for work. The stenographer in Mr. Love's office who is in love with the bookkeeper.
• Piggy | 14 min | Short, Drama, Horror: Sara is an overweight teen that lives in the shadow of a clique of cool girls holidaying in her village. Not even her childhood friend, Claudia, defends her when she's bullied at the local school.
• A Cabinet of Curiosities | Short: A short poetic documentary following the decline of the director's uncle's mental health, told through images of his curious collection of things left in his house.
• Avengers: Quantum Encounter | 13 min | Short, Action, Comedy: While Ant-Man and The Wasp demo their Quantum Core, an unexpected villain shows up, eager to get their hands on the powerful tech. The heroes need all the help they can get to save the day.
• Something's Got to Give | 37 min | Comedy, Short: Unfinished remake of "My Favorite Wife," due to the firing of Marilyn Monroe from the film. She was eventually re-hired, but died in August, 1962.

TV Series Logline Examples

Use the TV series logline examples to pitch television industry executives to be optioned (or developed) into a television series.

• The Walking Dead | 44 min | Drama, Horror, Thriller: Sheriff Deputy Rick Grimes wakes up from a coma to learn the world is in ruins and must lead a group of survivors to stay alive.
• Mr. Robot | 49 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller: Elliot, a brilliant but highly unstable young cyber-security engineer and vigilante hacker, becomes a key figure in a complex game of global dominance when he and his shadowy allies try to take down the corrupt corporation he works for.
• Homeland | 55 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery: A bipolar CIA operative becomes convinced a prisoner of war has been turned by al-Qaeda and is planning to carry out a terrorist attack on American soil.
• The Sopranos | 55 min | Crime, Drama: New Jersey mob boss Tony Soprano deals with personal and professional issues in his home and business life that affect his mental state, leading him to seek professional psychiatric counseling.
• Breaking Bad | 49 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller: A chemistry teacher diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer turns to manufacturing and selling methamphetamine with a former student in order to secure his family's future.
• Sex and the City | 30 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance: Four female New Yorkers gossip about their sex lives (or lack thereof) and find new ways to deal with being a woman in the late 1990s.
• Dexter | 53 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery: He's smart. He's lovable. He's Dexter Morgan, America's favorite serial killer, who spends his days solving crimes and nights committing them. Golden Globe winner Michael C. Hall stars in the hit SHOWTIME Original Series.
• Fargo | 53 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller: Various chronicles of deception, intrigue and murder in and around frozen Minnesota. Yet all of these tales mysteriously lead back one way or another to Fargo, North Dakota.
• Six Feet Under | 60 min | Comedy, Drama: A chronicle of the lives of a dysfunctional family who run an independent funeral home in Los Angeles.
• The Big Bang Theory | 22 min | Comedy, Romance: A woman who moves into an apartment across the hall from two brilliant but socially awkward physicists shows them how little they know about life outside of the laboratory.
• Succession | 60 min | Drama: The Roy family is known for controlling the biggest media and entertainment company in the world. However, their world changes when their father steps down from the company.
• Arrested Development | 22 min | Comedy: Level-headed son Michael Bluth takes over family affairs after his father is imprisoned. But the rest of his spoiled, dysfunctional family are making his job unbearable.
• Lost | 44 min | Adventure, Drama, Fantasy: The survivors of a plane crash are forced to work together in order to survive on a seemingly deserted tropical island.
• Modern Family | 22 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance: Three different but related families face trials and tribulations in their own uniquely comedic ways.
• Seinfeld | 22 min | Comedy: The continuing misadventures of neurotic New York City stand-up comedian Jerry Seinfeld and his equally neurotic New York City friends.
• Downton Abbey | 58 min | Drama, Romance: A chronicle of the lives of the British aristocratic Crawley family and their servants in the early twentieth century.
• Cheers | 22 min | Comedy, Drama: The regulars of the Boston bar "Cheers" share their experiences and lives with each other while drinking or working at the bar where everybody knows your name.
• Twin Peaks | 47 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery: An idiosyncratic FBI agent investigates the murder of a young woman in the even more idiosyncratic town of Twin Peaks?
• The X Files | 45 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery: Two F.B.I. Agents, Fox Mulder the believer and Dana Scully the skeptic, investigate the strange and unexplained, while hidden forces work to impede their efforts.
• 30 Rock | 22 min | Comedy: Liz Lemon, head writer of the sketch comedy show "TGS with Tracy Jordan", must deal with an arrogant new boss and a crazy new star, all while trying to run a successful television show without losing her mind.

Comedy Logline Examples

Learn from comedy logline examples on how to write your logline.

• Everything Everywhere All at Once: An aging Chinese immigrant is swept up in an insane adventure, where she alone can save the world by exploring other universes connecting with the lives she could have led.
• Once Upon a Time in... Hollywood: A faded television actor and his stunt double strive to achieve fame and success in the final years of Hollywood's Golden Age in 1969 Los Angeles.
• The Man from Toronto: The world's deadliest assassin and New York's biggest screw-up are mistaken for each other at an Airbnb rental.
• The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent: In this action-packed comedy, Nicolas Cage plays Nick Cage, channeling his iconic characters as he's caught between a superfan (Pedro Pascal) and a CIA agent (Tiffany Haddish).
• Ghostbusters: Afterlife: When a single mom and her two kids arrive in a small town, they begin to discover their connection to the original Ghostbusters and the secret legacy their grandfather left behind.
• Bodies Bodies Bodies: When a group of rich 20-somethings plan a hurricane party at a remote family mansion, a party game turns deadly in this fresh and funny look at backstabbing, fake friends, and one party gone very, very wrong.
• Deadpool: A wisecracking mercenary gets experimented on and becomes immortal but ugly, and sets out to track down the man who ruined his looks.
• Don't Look Up: Two low-level astronomers must go on a giant media tour to warn mankind of an approaching comet that will destroy planet Earth.
• Licorice Pizza: The story of Alana Kane and Gary Valentine growing up, running around and going through the treacherous navigation of first love in the San Fernando Valley, 1973.

Romance Logline Examples

Learn from romance logline examples on how to write your logline.

• The Valet: A movie star enlists a parking valet at a Beverly Hills restaurant to pose as her lover to cover for her relationship with a married man.
• Toscana: When a Danish chef travels to Tuscany to sell his father's business, he meets a local woman who inspires him to rethink his approach to life and love.
• Titanic: A seventeen-year-old aristocrat falls in love with a kind but poor artist aboard the luxurious, ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic.
• Casablanca: A cynical expatriate American cafe owner struggles to decide whether or not to help his former lover and her fugitive husband escape the Nazis in French Morocco.
• The Lost City: A reclusive romance novelist on a book tour with her cover model gets swept up in a kidnapping attempt that lands them both in a cutthroat jungle adventure.
• The Valet: A movie star enlists a parking valet at a Beverly Hills restaurant to pose as her lover to cover for her relationship with a married man.
• Toscana: When a Danish chef travels to Tuscany to sell his father's business, he meets a local woman who inspires him to rethink his approach to life and love.
• Three Thousand Years of Longing: A lonely scholar, on a trip to Istanbul, discovers a Djinn who offers her three wishes in exchange for his freedom.
• The Power of the Dog: Charismatic rancher Phil Burbank inspires fear and awe in those around him. When his brother brings home a new wife and her son, Phil torments them until he finds himself exposed to the possibility of love.
• Crazy, Stupid, Love: A middle-aged husband's life changes dramatically when his wife asks him for a divorce. He seeks to rediscover his manhood with the help of a newfound friend, Jacob, learning to pick up girls at bars.
• Twilight: When Bella Swan moves to a small town in the Pacific Northwest, she falls in love with Edward Cullen, a mysterious classmate who reveals himself to be a 108-year-old vampire.
• Pride and Prejudice: Sparks fly when spirited Elizabeth Bennet meets single, rich, and proud Mr. Darcy. But Mr. Darcy reluctantly finds himself falling in love with a woman beneath his class. Can each overcome their own pride and prejudice?
• The Proposal: A pushy boss forces her young assistant to marry her in order to keep her visa status in the U.S. and avoid deportation to Canada.
• Clueless: Shallow, rich and socially successful Cher is at the top of her Beverly Hills high school's pecking scale. Seeing herself as a matchmaker, Cher first coaxes two teachers into dating each other.
• Stars at Noon: In 1984's Nicaragua, a mysterious English businessman and a headstrong American journalist strike up a romance as they soon become embroiled in a dangerous labyrinth of lies and conspiracies and are forced to try and escape the country.
• Something Wild: A free-spirited woman "kidnaps" a yuppie for a weekend of adventure. But the fun quickly takes a dangerous turn when her ex-convict husband shows up.
• The Great Gatsby: A writer and wall street trader, Nick, finds himself drawn to the past and lifestyle of his millionaire neighbor, Jay Gatsby.
• Grease: Good girl Sandy Olsson and greaser Danny Zuko fell in love over the summer. When they unexpectedly discover they're now in the same high school, will they be able to rekindle their romance?
• Beauty and the Beast: A selfish Prince is cursed to become a monster for the rest of his life, unless he learns to fall in love with a beautiful young woman he keeps prisoner.
• Sleeping Beauty: A haunting portrait of Lucy, a young university student drawn into a mysterious hidden world of unspoken desires.
• Bridesmaids: Competition between the maid of honor and a bridesmaid, over who is the bride's best friend, threatens to upend the life of an out-of-work pastry chef.
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall: Devastated Peter takes a Hawaiian vacation in order to deal with the recent break-up with his TV star girlfriend, Sarah. Little does he know, Sarah's traveling to the same resort as her ex - and she's bringing along her new boyfriend.
• La La Land: While navigating their careers in Los Angeles, a pianist and an actress fall in love while attempting to reconcile their aspirations for the future.
• You've got Mail: Book superstore magnate, Joe Fox and independent book shop owner, Kathleen Kelly fall in love in the anonymity of the Internet both blissfully unaware that he's trying to put her out of business.

Horror Logline Examples

Learn from horror logline examples on how to write your logline.

• Psycho: A Phoenix secretary embezzles $40,000 from her employer's client, goes on the run, and checks into a remote motel run by a young man under the domination of his mother. / An Alfred Hitchcock Masterpiece
• Rear Window: A wheelchair-bound photographer spies on his neighbors from his apartment window and becomes convinced one of them has committed murder. / It only takes one witness to spoil the perfect crime
• The Silence of the Lambs: A young F.B.I. cadet must receive the help of an incarcerated and manipulative cannibal killer to help catch another serial killer, a madman who skins his victims. / From The Terrifying Best Seller
• Alien: The crew of a commercial spacecraft encounter a deadly lifeform after investigating an unknown transmission.
• Psycho: A Phoenix secretary embezzles $40,000 from her employer's client, goes on the run, and checks into a remote motel run by a young man under the domination of his mother.
• The Shining: A family heads to an isolated hotel for the winter where a sinister presence influences the father into violence, while his psychic son sees horrific forebodings from both past and future.
• The Exorcist: When a 12-year-old girl is possessed by a mysterious entity, her mother seeks the help of two priests to save her.
• Rosemary's Baby: A young couple trying for a baby moves into an aging, ornate apartment building on Central Park West, where they find themselves surrounded by peculiar neighbors.
• Night of the living dead: A ragtag group of Pennsylvanians barricade themselves in an old farmhouse to remain safe from a horde of flesh-eating ghouls that are ravaging the East Coast of the United States.
• Frankenstein: Dr. Frankenstein dares to tamper with life and death by creating a human monster out of lifeless body parts.
• Halloween: Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again.
• The Birds: A wealthy San Francisco socialite pursues a potential boyfriend to a small Northern California town that slowly takes a turn for the bizarre when birds of all kinds suddenly begin to attack people.
• Zombieland: A shy student trying to reach his family in Ohio, a gun-toting bruiser in search of the last Twinkie and a pair of sisters striving to get to an amusement park join forces in a trek across a zombie-filled America.
• Saw: Two strangers awaken in a room with no recollection of how they got there, and soon discover they're pawns in a deadly game perpetrated by a notorious serial killer.
• American Psycho: A wealthy New York City investment banking executive, Patrick Bateman, hides his alternate psychopathic ego from his co-workers and friends as he delves deeper into his violent, hedonistic fantasies.
• The Fly: A brilliant but eccentric scientist begins to transform into a giant man/fly hybrid after one of his experiments goes horribly wrong.
• A Quiet Place: In a post-apocalyptic world, a family is forced to live in silence while hiding from monsters with ultra-sensitive hearing.
• An American Werewolf in London: Two American college students on a walking tour of Britain are attacked by a werewolf that none of the locals will admit exists.
• The Omen: Mysterious deaths surround an American ambassador. Could the child that he is raising actually be the Antichrist? The Devil's own son? 
• Dracula: The centuries old vampire Count Dracula comes to England to seduce his barrister Jonathan Harker's fiancée Mina Murray and inflict havoc in the foreign land.
• Jacob's Ladder: Mourning his dead child, a haunted Vietnam War veteran attempts to uncover his past while suffering from a severe case of dissociation. To do so, he must decipher reality and life from his own dreams, delusions, and perceptions of death.
• Carrie: Carrie White, a shy, friendless teenage girl who is sheltered by her domineering, religious mother, unleashes her telekinetic powers after being humiliated by her classmates at her senior prom.
• The Haunting: Hill House has stood for about 90 years and appears haunted: its inhabitants have always met strange, tragic ends. Now Dr. John Markway has assembled a team of people who he thinks will prove whether or not the house is haunted.
• Split: Three girls are kidnapped by a man with a diagnosed 23 distinct personalities. They must try to escape before the apparent emergence of a frightful new 24th.
• PI: A paranoid mathematician searches for a key number that will unlock the universal patterns found in nature.
• Scream: A year after the murder of her mother, a teenage girl is terrorized by a new killer, who targets the girl and her friends by using horror films as part of a deadly game.
• Possession: A woman starts exhibiting increasingly disturbing behavior after asking her husband for a divorce. Suspicions of infidelity soon give way to something much more sinister.
• Eraserhead: Henry Spencer tries to survive his industrial environment, his angry girlfriend, and the unbearable screams of his newly born mutant child.

Logline Examples by Genre

Here are ten logline examples across various genres:

•  Sci-Fi: “In a post-apocalyptic world where memories can be traded, a young woman with a unique ability becomes the target of power-hungry factions, forcing her to choose between her survival and the future of humanity.”
• Romantic Comedy: “When a cynical wedding planner, recovering from a failed romance, is assigned to plan her ex-boyfriend’s wedding, she must confront her past feelings and ensure the wedding goes off without a hitch.”
• Fantasy: “Trapped in a mystical land ruled by dragons, a timid librarian discovers she’s the last Dragon Whisperer and must rally an unlikely group of allies to prevent an eternal war.”
• Horror: “After moving into a secluded mansion, a family discovers it’s inhabited by vengeful spirits of its previous owners, and they must solve the house’s mystery before becoming permanent residents.”
• Drama: “A renowned pianist, diagnosed with a degenerative hearing disorder, embarks on a journey to reconnect with his estranged family before his world goes silent.”
• Action: “When a retired hitman’s daughter is kidnapped by his old enemies, he’s forced back into the underworld for one final mission to save her, unraveling dark secrets along the way.”
• Historical: “During WWII, a fearless nurse in occupied France joins the resistance to save Jewish children from Nazi persecution, risking her life and confronting personal betrayals.”
• Thriller: “A tech-savvy journalist stumbles upon a global conspiracy when her artificial intelligence assistant starts sending her cryptic messages, leading her down a dangerous path of secrets and lies.”
• Mystery: “In a sleepy coastal town, a detective with a troubled past is drawn into a complex web of intrigue when a series of seemingly unrelated murders all point to a decades-old secret.”
• Adventure: “Tasked with finding a legendary lost city in the Amazon, a bumbling professor and a cunning thief form an unlikely alliance, navigating treacherous terrains and battling rival explorers.”

These logline examples illustrate the range and flexibility of loglines, showcasing character, conflict, and stakes in just a sentence or two.

Logline Writing Tips

Loglines have the following qualities.

• The logline example creates a visual world in the readers mind.
• The logline describes how the journey begins.
• The audience roots for the character to succeed.

Summary

The logline is your core selling point when you pitch a film or TV show to film producers and execs. The length of a logline varies from between 35 - 50 words to describe the main characters, setting, plot and genre of the film. Loglines are also used to pitch films and TV shows to industry professionals for development and financing.