The results from my Black List logline competition

Last week I pledged to read at least the first fifteen pages of four scripts, selected from several dozen submissions.  This was the latest run at an offer I've made twice before.  Last time, I read scripts and ended up praising three of them.  Though two of those three turned out to be from writers with representation, a third, CHAMBERS, attracted the attention of screenwriter F. Scott Frazier and manager Brian McCurley of DMG Entertainment, who have been representing the script since soon after I posted my review.

The writer, Stan Himes, wrote me to say, "I want to note that I didn't sign any official representation contract. They're simply representing the script and trying to make a sale. And as a guy in snowy Iowa, it's great to have someone in LA championing my work, so I appreciate their efforts, your kind review and the mere existence of the Black List site."

So did any of the four selections this time make the grade?

The promise was to read at least fifteen pages.  Two of the scripts got me just about to the halfway mark.  The other two got me the distance.  In fact, I ended up reading one of them twice.  After the first read, I liked it, but I wasn't quite feeling the passion for it I was hoping to find.  I liked the premise and a lot of the early stuff, but this read was also coming near the end of a long day, so I allowed for the possibility that something was affecting the read.  The only fair thing to do was give it a fresh read under better circumstances.

But while I felt it was good, I couldn't shake the feeling that it could be better.  I ended up contacting the writer and explaining this all to him and in the course of our email conversation, he mentioned a couple ideas for a subsequent draft that immediately clicked for me. "Go write THAT!" I wanted to tell him.  By the end of our discussion, I definitely felt it would be better for the script if it didn't get a big push until it was in a stronger state.  And I have such faith in the writer that I've invited him to send me a subsequent draft when he feels it's ready.

I think you only get one chance to make a big impression with your script.  That's especially true when you're pushing it out via the internet, where that paper trail lives forever.  I don't want to write a review that makes you think the script is pretty good. I want a review that convinces you the script will be great.

None of the scripts were quite there - some might have been close, about at the level of "Consider With Reservations."  In fact, in general the scripts were pretty good.  None of them had any of the really common amateur errors.  True, I bailed on two of the scripts halfway through, but that had more to do with me knowing they weren't likely to end up as strong as I needed them to be for a full-throated endorsement.  I could have bailed after 15 pages, but I saw enough initial promise that I figured it would be worth it to see things through.

I absolutely feel that all of these writers whose work I read this past week could be really great if they keep at it.  I recognized one writing team - Jeffrey and Susan Bridges - as a team who submitted to my first open offer just over a year ago. I saw a lot of improvement in their work just in that time. The writing flowed better, everything about it seemed more natural, and I daresay there was a confidence that wasn't there before.

To all of you - not just the writers of the four scripts, but everyone who submitted to my offer - keep writing.  Keep improving.  One bad reaction will never be the end of the world.  In fact, it could even motivate you to push yourself further.

Inevitably, I know some of you are going to ask if I plan on reading any of the runner-up scripts. I make no promises, but there are a couple loglines I'm curious about.  If time permits, I might look over a couple in the next few weeks.  I wouldn't suggest keeping your script uploaded only on the off-chance I read it, though.  If some of you were planning on terminating your hosting, don't renew just on my account.

So this didn't end quite the way I hoped, but I don't regret any of my selections.  Good luck to all of you.

My Top 4 Selections from the Submitted Black List loglines

I dug through each and every logline that was submitted on Tuesday (and left comments on each one, so be sure to check those out) and ended up with 12 loglines on my short list.  After careful consideration, I made my Top 4 selections.  I will read the first 15 pages of each of those scripts, in the hopes that at least a few of them will compel me to read the entire submission.

Any scripts I complete that I feel deserve a ranking of 8 or above will be reviewed on the blog in the hopes of drawing more attention to them.

Last time I ended up reading four full scripts of the eight I initially selected, so I didn't have any need to reach beyond the original eight selections.  However, in the event that none of the four scripts really keeps me going beyond the first fifteen pages, I may delve into some of the runner-ups, time permitting.

And of course, I encourage anyone with Black List access to check out these scripts and see if there's anything here that you like.

The Top 4 Selections:

Title: NARCOSIS
Writer: Chris Drzewiecki
Genre: Contained thriller chock full of ghosts, sharks, treasure. All killer, no filler
After their boat is pulled to the bottom of the ocean by a vengeful entity, a Father, his terminal son and a deranged dive captain must find their way back to the surface while suffering from nitrogen narcosis and a boat that is steadily filling with water. “The Descent” meets “Jacob’s Ladder” on the ocean floor.
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/10945


Title: SKYJACKERS
Writers: Jeffrey and Susan Bridges
Genre: Action
Logline: A disgraced Air Force pilot is given the opportunity to join a group of sky pirates, who use jet packs to steal millions from planes in flight. But she discovers the head of the organization has a far darker goal, and she must choose between the family she never had or a global nuclear war.
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13077

Title: Home
Writers: Sarah Carman, James Roland, David Veloz
Genre: Suspense/Horror
Logline: When a young couple moves into a new house they find out it is haunted not from the past, but from their own future.
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13838


Title: AMERICAN ANTICHRIST
Writer: Maxwell Heesch
Genre: Supernatural Comedy
Logline: It's 'The Omen' by way of John Hughes when a mild-mannered kid inadvertently sets in motion the End of Days at his high school after discovering that he is the Antichrist. 
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/7478 


The Runners-Up -


Title: THE HOTLINE
Writer: Greg Brainos, Joseph Stanton
Genre: Comedy, Dark Comedy
Logline: A young humanitarian bent on saving the world loses sight of his goal when he gets caught up in the big business of a for-profit suicide hotline.
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/7925

Title: THREE PERCENT OF NOTHING
Writer: Andrew Friedhof
Genre: Drama / Crime Thriller
Logline: A sports agent fears his protégé turned nemesis could ruin him by stealing his last few clients, so when the biggest name he reps – a Lakers superstar – asks for his help in getting rid of a young woman’s corpse, he reluctantly gets his hands dirty only to later watch his entire life unravel.
Link: https://blcklst.com//members/scripts/view/13761

Title: THE EUNUCH OF NOTTINGHAM
Writer: Thomas Serio
Genre: Comedy
Logline: The Sheriff of Nottingham uses a potion to change his timid, nice-guy image in order to land his dream girl, Maid Marion, who'd rather be with the town bandit Robin Hood.
Link: https://blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/7279 


Title: The Squire
Writer: Rod Thompson
Genre: Family Drama, Coming of Age, Man-Cry
Logline: An imaginative young boy enlists the help of a reclusive Iraq War veteran to accomplish four 'feats of bravery' that he believes will save his dying mother.
Link: https://blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13067 

TITLE: Pop Hit
Writer: Jeffrey R. Field
Genre: Dark Comedy
Logline: When a one-hit wonder singer-songwriter is hired to mentor the world's biggest teenage pop sensation, he uses the opportunity to secretly sabotage the bratty young singer's career. Think a contemporary AMADEUS with Justin Bieber.
Nicholl Semifinalist Script 
Link: https://blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13867


Title: INFIDELITY
Writers: Akil Goin and Kareem Richardson
Genre: Courtroom / Crime / Drama
Logline: An ambitious lawyer's heart, morals, career and relationship is tested when she's seduced and blackmailed into defending an old flame for her best friend's murder.
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13846


Title: Mom's Weekend
Writer: Tomasz Walkosz
Genre: Comedy
Logline: With aspirations of proving to the world they aren't some boring soccer moms, three mundane women travel to their kids university with the single goal of reclaiming their youth.
Link: https://www.blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13085  
 

Title: CRITICAL INCIDENT, KENTUCKY
Writer: Chinaza Onuzo
Genre: Action Thriller
Logline: When a Mad Bomber takes a hospital in rural Kentucky hostage, Amos, an FBI Agent and a recovering sex addict is pulled back into the high stakes world of hostage negotiation and rescue.
Link: https://blcklst.com/members/scripts/view/13222

UPDATED: The Lucky 7 [now 8] loglines that I have agreed to read!

UPDATED BELOW with an 8th script.

So the loglines are in and it looks like we had about 63 Black List submissions for yesterday's offer.  I said I'd select up to eight scripts out of those loglines and read at least 15 pages.  As it turns out, when I went through and picked out the loglines that seemed like the most interesting reads, I ended up with seven, so that seems like a good place to leave it.

Among the rest there were several "second tier" choices, so in the event that all seven of these have me dropping them at 15 pages, I might be inclined to check out some of the second tier ones.  Still, I picked these scripts because the concepts seemed like the ones I was mostly likely to enjoy - and also because if I were to endorse them, they would probably be the most likely sorts of concepts to garner other interest.  (That probably explains the heavy bias towards thrillers.  I'd hoped for a few more comedies or rom-coms, and while there were other good loglines, I didn't feel them demanding my attention.

So without further ado, here are the Lucky 7!

My Future Ex-Sister-In-Law 
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Logline: A new couple must hide their relationship from their respective siblings—a divorced duo who hate each other.

Mickey Stanton and the Legions of Darkness! 
Genre: Action/Comedy/Supernatural
Logline: When a commander of the underworld leads an unholy invasion to the surface, three lowly gas station attendants will battle his vile horde to stop them from wreaking havoc across the entire planet!

Cold Crossing 
Genre: Thriller
Logline: A desperate woman hatches a risky plot to escape her abusive husband, but when complications put her little girl in the crossfire, she'll sacrifice anything and anyone to save her daughter.

Where Death Follows
 Genre: Thriller
Logline: When the FBI guns down his father, the teenage son of a serial killer goes on the run from a relentless and unstable Federal Agent who will stop at nothing to see him dead.

Chambers
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Logline: A wallflower college student, horrified at the discovery of a torture chamber hidden by his recently deceased father, struggles to save a young woman still trapped in it while his domineering brother wants to continue their father's work.

H8RZ (HATERS)
Genre: Crime/Mystery/Thriller
Logline: The lone survivor of a massive school explosion is held against his will while the administration, police and school board appointed lawyer sift through a story of blackmail, cyber-bullying, and murder, to try to figure out exactly what happened.

Farewell, Great Leader 
Genre: Drama/Thriller
Logline: A filmmaker and his actress ex-wife are abducted by Kim Jong-Il and forced to make a Godzilla knock-off propaganda film. Their only hope of escape is to use the film's final explosive stunt to cover their tracks.

I'll try to work my way through most of these within the next week and post any reviews either early next week or right after the 4th of July holiday weekend.  I think I'll go through the other submitted loglines and maybe offer indications of why some of them didn't get chosen, so be checking the comments on the earlier post throughout the weekend as I work my way through those.

Have a good weekend everyone!

Update 7:00pm Friday - This is embarrassing. When you guys post a comment here, I get it sent to me in an email. I was using those emails to keep track of the most interesting loglines and then culled the list down from there.  Well, I goofed up and must have accidentally deleted one of those emails which included a script I was interested in.  I didn't discover this until I went through the comments to reply and realized I'd forgotten one.

(Don't worry. I've scrutinized all the loglines and there weren't any others that fell through the cracks, so this will be the only update.)

So I'm pleased to announce one more script will be joining my to-read pile:


Wicked Garden
Genre: Horror / Horror Comedy
Logline: A troubled teen inadvertently unleashes an evil garden gnome, who's hellbent on protecting his garden, and must stop it before it kills everyone he loves. In the vein of "Child's Play" and "Gremlins".

My sincerest apologies to you all for the oversight, especially to the writer.

Reader question: Loglines, ratings and assessments on Black List 3.0

Okay, so this is an old email from October that I neglected, in part because it was too long to respond to quickly (take that as a lesson - the more succinct emails are likely to get replies faster.)

Hilary writes:

Aloha Zuul! I actually wrote you an email or two before I headed out to LA a couple of months ago, and if you answered, it got lost in cyberspace. 

[Sidebar: I've checked my email folders and I can't find this earlier email, which makes me worried that the Spam folder might have eaten some legit emails]

In the meantime, I am very glad that the Blacklist has gone live because I uploaded the three screenplays I am networking. And the first review is in, for AETERNITAS. 9/10!

And the reason I am telling you this is not to gloat, but it is in response to your call for the as-yet-unrated Blacklist uploads. Which, unfortunately for me, just closed yesterday.

I have a couple of questions for you, since I do feel that I am behind the learning curve here of shopping projects here in LA and I am not particularly good with loglines. I think mine are serviceable enough, yet the logline that the reviewer wrote isn't quite standard either. I wrote a big beautiful story that I think is mid-budget, but the reviewer states it is a blockbuster that needs more dialogue in order to appeal to large audiences (? I thought the bigger action, sci-fi, fantasies are obviously minimal with their dialogue?). And then there's a bit of confusion between low dialogue/narrow audience, OR right director/large international audiences.

So, how important is their logline at this point? And is the low-dialogue/high-risk assessment an actual turn off for you professional Blacklist members?

Lastly, I'm already hearing from my network, "Congrats! But I've already told you I am busy with projects for the next few years..." So, I really need new people to come forward. Producers and directors who are available and looking. What's the timeline that you have seen with this?

Okay, there's a lot to reply to here:

- As far as the Black List logline, I'd say it's somewhat important, but the logline that I end up reading nine times out of ten is the one that you set as your logline.  That's also the logline that goes out in the email, so that's the most important one.  I looked up your script, and I have to admit, your logline doesn't really tell me much about the story.  It's more like the tagline that one might see on a poster.

The Black List's logline is a little better, but it tells me nothing about the characters who inhabit your world. I don't know anything about the characters who I'm supposed to invest in.  As the pro reviewer struggled with that, it makes me worried that the idea might be TOO epic.  (If I read for people who made epics, that'd be less of an issue, but there's a narrower market for those scripts.)

- The note about the script needing more dialogue puzzles me. I don't often see reviews that go out of their way to point out a dearth of dialogue, so it's telling that it bugged the reviewer.  However, I should point out that the full "Weaknesses" assessment reads:

"The script has the potential to alienate a large audience due to its highly convoluted premise and lack of much dialogue. It is a script for a very specific and narrow audience."

The words "alienate a large audience" and "high convoluted premise" concern me FAR more than a lack of dialogue.  This is especially true when the Prospects section says the script is "big budget, high risk." Maybe there are some people checking out the Black List who will be looking for that kind of material to develop.   My feeling is that most people will take that as a warning to stay away.

On the final points, I get the sense that the waiting period varies for every script.  Now, as this reply is coming months later, it's probably safe to assume that whatever heat you got from the 9 rating has dissipated.  I'd say that the odds of a connection being made go down after the first four weeks of being highlighted in either the emails or the Top Scripts lists.  That's more than enough time for people to download the script, get around to reading it and make their call.

Sure if further reviews and ratings come in, that could help extend the shelf life, but my sense is that most of the people who have been signed weren't waiting around for much more than two months, if that much.

Read MCCARTHY on the Black List site! And an update on the other submissions

Well, I made it through the first 25 scripts that were submitted to my post on Black List 3.0.  I have to admit, the response was far beyond anything I expected.  I wasn't sure 25 people would even take me up on the offer, let alone the 60+ requests currently sitting in the comment thread of the earlier post.

I want to say right off the bat that I was somewhat impressed with the overall level of writing that I saw in those 25 submissions.  I've read for a contest or two and I've got plenty of experience with amateur-level submissions, so a part of me fully expected to be screaming "Oh dear God! Why did I sign up for this!" well before I got through ten submissions.  As a group, you guys are far more promising than most of the people submitting to contests and I saw blessedly little of the horrible newbie mistakes that drive me to drink.

Upon reflection, that makes sense.  The people responding fastest to my offer were more likely to be regular readers of my blog.  Thus, it's a good sign that what I've been bitching about for four years has really sunk in with you people.  For starters, I don't think I recall a single gratuitous mention of a woman's cleavage.

Of the 25, I think there might have only been two - perhaps three - scripts where I knew within a few pages that this was going to be a pass.  I expected at least a third of the scripts would have me stopping after a few pages to ask, "wait, what did I just read?"  So good work in not embarrassing yourselves.

I promised everyone I'd give them ten pages.  More than half of you had me intrigued enough to keep going further, just to see if your execution showed signs of living up to your concept, or just to see if you could sustain some of the positives of your script.  I'd say at least fifteen of you got me to page 20 and at least 8 of you had me reading past p. 35.  I considered announcing which scripts had me reading deeper into them, but I realized that probably wouldn't be helpful.  In some cases, it was the concept that kept me going, only for me to realize by p. 60 that things were being developed too conventionally or too slowly.  In other cases, a script started with a very strong first act, only to meander in the second act long enough that I knew it wouldn't be a high consider.  So I didn't want to leave anyone with the impression "You had me until p. 44, but p. 45 is where you fucked up, so fix that."

This is because I wasn't just looking for "okay" writing, or "decent" writing - I was looking for strong writing.  More than that - I was looking for a strong script.  After all, giving a good review to the script is like throwing up a flare on that specific idea.  Those of you guys with stronger concepts obviously had a distinct advantage here - especially those of you who communicated those concepts well in your logline.  Generic or familiar-sounding ideas had me less enthused from the start, but there were plenty of loglines that had me thinking "I can't wait to see how they develop THAT!"  (Not coincidentally, those were the writers who often got 30 pages or so to make their case.)

The flip side to this is that there were a number of concepts that faced an uphill battle with me for one reason or another.  In some cases, the issue was that the story was just too mundane or "small."  In other cases, the factor was a genre I didn't have a particular affinity for.  For instance, I'm not a huge Western fan - but at least two Westerns got me to page 25 or further.  I bring this up to underline that just because I didn't respond to a particualar idea, it doesn't follow that everyone will be as apathetic.

I was reading these submissions specifically with an eye to finding scripts that would rate at 8, 9 or 10.  I wanted to find the real undiscovered gems that could stand up to scrutiny once passed into professional hands.  I'm optimistic that there are a lot of 6s in those submissions, and 6s that could easily make it to a rating of 7 or even 8 with some rewriting.

Also, one writer let me know via Twitter that he'd seen a marked uptick in traffic to his script and even heard from an agent after submitting his submission in the comment thread last week.  He seemed to believe that there was a direct connection between the two, and while I'd love to crow about that, I've not seen many instances of reps following up on material promoted on my site before.  (Having said that, traffic was WAY up on Friday.)  But if anyone else has something like that happen, please let us know, okay?

But what you really want to know is did I find that undiscovered gem?  Yes - sort of.  MCCARTHY by Justin Kremer was the clear winner in this showdown of the first 25 scripts.  In some ways I'm surprised and some ways I'm not.  This script was spotlit in an email the Black List sent out last week to all their professional users, following a very positive evaluation from one of the Black List readers.  Also, the Black List algorithm predicted that I'd rate this script as an 8.3, which is more or less accurate.

Beyond that, I'm not big on political scripts.  Despite COLLEGE REPUBLICANS being #1 on the Black List two years ago, I wasn't really a fan of it.  So it's not like I'm predisposed to the material - plus I had to look at COLLEGE REPUBLICANS through the marketability lens, and political material is kind of a powder keg these days.  My feeling is Repulican viewers would claim that the film was an unfair, propeganda-driven hatchet job on Karl Rove (oh, the irony!) while Democratic viewers would take issue with the fact that it doesn't depict Rove as half the sub-human pond scum we know him to be.

(And if you take issue with that characterization, look up what the man did to John McCain in the 2000 primary election.  It was a vile, evil act of race-bating that not only relied on the worst elements of his party, but in fact fed those fires to make those elements a dominating force in that party.  I've always loved Cindy McCain for saying, "No, I'd stab him in the front," after being asked if she ever would be tempted to stab Rove in the back.)

But a bio-pic of noted asshole and Senator Joe McCarthy is a different prospect, because nearly everyone with half a brain agrees that McCarthy's anti-Communist witch hunts were an horrific abuse of power and a dark time in our nation's history.  (Those lacking that half a brain can be discovered here.) But there's something fascinating about exploring a person who more or less branded himself as a larger-than-life defender of freedom while basically making his name synonymous with the most egregious and repugnant forms of political grandstanding.

This is not only a well-written, well-paced script - it has what every script needs: a fantastic villain.  One scene in particular stands out, about 30 pages in, McCarthy's grandstanding has already begun to make waves.  A campaigning Dwight Eisenhower is so disgusted by his actions, he doesn't even want to be photographed with him.  Instead, the Presidential candidate requests a private meeting with the Senator, during which he essentially says "The fuck?!" and "No, seriously... the fuck?!"  He basically tells McCarthy that he doesn't agree with what the Senator stands for and isn't scared to say that in public.  He demands McCarthy apologize to the people he's hurt and McCarthy's response can pretty much be translated as, "Eh, bite me" and "Suck it, Ike."

So McCarthy has to introduce Eisenhower at a rally and he does just that and only that.  No puffed up speech.  No "I endorse this guy." Pretty much "Here he is.  He's running for President."  And then the amazing thing happens.  Eisenhower comes out ... and basically endorses everything that the slimy Senator stands for.

That set of scenes alone ensured that I was gonna stick around to see Jackass Joe run out of town on a rail when the the wheel of fortune eventually turned against him.

Those of you with Black List access can find McCarthy here.

I'll gradually work my way through the other submissions.  November's a busy month for me and I know I won't be able to blow through 25 scripts as fast as I did before.  I'm still optimistic I can find one really good script that hasn't yet been spot-lit by Black List readers.  I recognize that to pull that off, I'm going to need to move fast though.  I'll keep you guys updated as I go.

Loglines - concept or story?

Jill asks:

I've been following your web series on screenwriting and went back through my notes on what you said regarding idea vs. concept vs. story -- very helpful by the way. I'm curious as to your thoughts on what should be written in one's logline: the concept or the story? 

 I've read so much conflicting advice regarding what to put in your logline (and seen both -- a slick, mean, six-word concept and two long sentences that describe the story/essence of the screenplay).

Ask ten different people this question and you're likely to get nearly ten different responses.  I covered this before here, where I gave this advice:

I'd say to shoot for one sentence [in length], but don't sweat it if you need two sentences to cover everything. It's also not a bad idea to include some plot details - or at least the main hook of the story and how it relates to the main character. A good trick is the TV Guide technique - write the logline the way you imagine that TV Guide would summarize the story. 

Take Die Hard for example: "A New York cop tries to save his estranged wife from terrorists who have taken an L.A. office building hostage on Christmas Eve." Bam! One sentence and I know the protagonist, the antagonist, the hooks and the stakes.

So in that case, I guess I'm advocating the concept be the logline.  But that's a helluva lot easier to do when you're dealing with a high concept idea.  What about something more character-driven?

This is the IMDB logline for Like Crazy: "A British college student falls for an American student, only to be separated from him when she's banned from the U.S. after overstaying her visa."

Concept or story?  I say "concept."  That description tells me what the film is about, but doesn't get into any of the ins and outs of the various plot turns along the way.  And you know what, that brief description still suggests enough that I can get a sense of if this is the sort of script that fits my particular needs, at least with regard to genre and scope.

But if your approach differs, please sound off in comments.

Loglines

Woody sent me this email last week:

The idea of writing log lines is not a problem to me- I get it. But I have never found a good resource for what Hollywood wants to see. Most log lines seem too vague or read as generic, recycled sentences that could describe anything. I don't know if I am reading industry standards or amateur hour sentences. Wondering if you have any advice on what catches your eye:...Should they be one sentence or is two OK?...Do you need details on the plot or something that generally piques your interest?...etc. Here is one I am working with as an example.

EXPOSURE- The iconic artist of the previous decade, photographer David Ansell laments the erosion of his reputation to simply being famous for being famous. The entire world is nearly turned inside out as his search for a new muse reveals a violent, ancient force and one woman's insidious plot to control it.

There are slightly different schools of thought on this, so I wouldn't be surprised if people weigh in with different opinions in the comments. To cover your first questions, I'd say to shoot for one sentence, but don't sweat it if you need two sentences to cover everything. It's also not a bad idea to include some plot details - or at least the main hook of the story and how it relates to the main character. A good trick is the TV Guide technique - write the logline the way you imagine that TV Guide would summarize the story.

Take Die Hard for example: "A New York cop tries to save his estranged wife from terrorists who have taken an L.A. office building hostage on Christmas Eve." Bam! One sentence and I know the protagonist, the antagonist, the hooks and the stakes.

The other trick is to keep it simple. Your logline is a little wordy and uses words that could come off as pretentious. Some people also say that the loglines shouldn't have character names. Given that, I might rewrite your logline as follows:

"An iconic photographer seeks a new muse in his struggle to become relevant again, but the entire world is nearly turned inside out when his search reveals a violent, ancient force and one woman's insidious plot to control it."

Right there you've got the protagonist, the antagonist, the protagonist's quest and the main conflict of the story. This also suggest that the genre of the script is a supernatural thriller of sorts - is that assumption accurate? Giving your reader an idea of exactly what genre you're playing in is another good idea, some would say an essential one. If I know my boss is looking for a female-driven romantic comedy with a sports element, you don't want me mistaking your pitch for a male driven baseball drama.

I hope this was helpful.