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MacGuffin

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This article is about the plot device. For the block cipher, see MacGuffin (cipher).

A MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin or Maguffin) is a plot device that motivates the characters and advances the story, but has little other relevance to the story.

The director and producer Alfred Hitchcock popularized both the term "MacGuffin" and the technique. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, Hitchcock explained the term in a 1939 lecture at Columbia University: "[W]e have a name in the studio, and we call it the 'MacGuffin.' It is the mechanical element that usually crops up in any story. In crook stories it is always the necklace and in spy stories it is always the papers."

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[edit] Description

The element that distinguishes a MacGuffin from other types of plot devices is that it is not important what object the MacGuffin specifically is. Anything that serves as a motivation will do. A true MacGuffin is essentially interchangeable. Its importance will generally be accepted completely by the story's characters, with minimal explanation. From the audience's perspective, the MacGuffin is not the point of the story.

The technique is common in films, especially thrillers. Commonly, though not always, the MacGuffin is the central focus of the film in the first act, and then declines in significance as the struggles and motivations of the characters take center stage. Sometimes the MacGuffin is all but forgotten by the end of the film.

Because a MacGuffin is, by definition, ultimately unimportant to the story, its use can test the suspension of disbelief of audiences. Well-done works will compensate for this, with a good story, interesting characters, talented acting/writing, and so on. Inferior films, which fail in those areas, often only highlight a MacGuffin, sometimes to the point of absurdity. MacGuffins may be acceptable to the general audience, but fail to be believable for experts in the subject matter (such as a particular technology, or historical detail).

[edit] History

According to film historian Kalton C. Lahue in his book Bound and Gagged (a history of silent-film serials), the actress Pearl White used the term "weenie" to identify whatever physical object (a roll of film, a rare coin, expensive diamonds) impelled the villains and virtuous characters to pursue each other through the convoluted plots of The Perils of Pauline and the other silent serials in which White starred.

Interviewed in 1966 by François Truffaut, Alfred Hitchcock illustrated the term "MacGuffin" with this story:

"It might be a Scottish name, taken from a story about two men in a train. One man says, 'What's that package up there in the baggage rack?' And the other answers, 'Oh that's a McGuffin.' The first one asks 'What's a McGuffin?' 'Well' the other man says, 'It's an apparatus for trapping lions in the Scottish Highlands.' The first man says, 'But there are no lions in the Scottish Highlands,' and the other one answers 'Well, then that's no McGuffin!' So you see, a McGuffin is nothing at all."

Hitchcock related this anecdote in a television interview for Richard Schickel's documentary The Men Who Made the Movies. Hitchcock's verbal delivery made it clear that the second man has thought up the McGuffin explanation as a roundabout method of telling the first man to mind his own business. According to author Ken Mogg, screenwriter Angus MacPhail may have originally coined the term. MacPhail was a friend of Hitchcock. [1]

More succinctly, on TV interviews from time to time, Hitchcock defined the MacGuffin as the object around which the plot revolves, and as to what that object specifically is, "The audience don't care!"

[edit] Examples

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[edit] Films

  • One particularly famous early movie example of a MacGuffin is the titular statuette in The Maltese Falcon (1941).[2]
  • Another famous MacGuffin is "Rosebud," the sleigh seen at the end of the film Citizen Kane (1941), meant to symbolize the lost innocence of the millionaire protagonist, Charles Foster Kane (Orson Welles).
  • The quotation above by Alfred Hitchcock regarding the tune in which information was encoded refers to The Lady Vanishes (1938). The woman carrying the melodic code is kidnapped while riding a train, though the contents of the message have no bearing on the film's plot. [3]
  • In Notorious (1946), the uranium hidden in wine bottles is a MacGuffin. It is the reason the story takes place, but could just as easily have been diamonds, gold, or rare wine. In fact, during production, there was discussion of changing it to diamonds to be more believable [4] [5].
  • The gold treasure in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948).
  • In Brick, the "bricks" involved in the plot are essentially MacGuffins, as the identity of the drug is never revealed. Emily's pregnancy can also be seen as a MacGuffin.
  • In North by Northwest (1959), the MacGuffin is the unspecified secret information known by a man for whom Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is mistaken. Throughout the movie, Thornhill tries to find the man, without realizing that he does not exist. [6]
  • In Psycho (1960), the money that the character Marion Crane has stolen from her employer is a MacGuffin. After Marion's subsequent disappearance, her sister and boyfriend suspect Norman Bates has murdered her for the money. However, it is revealed that Bates killed Marion without even knowing the money existed. In the end, it could have been jewelry or any number of things. The money was simply a plot device to get her to the Bates Motel. [7]
  • In Sergio Leone's famous western The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, the gold the main characters are searching for is a MacGuffin.
  • High Anxiety (1977) is a Mel Brooks parody of various Hitchcock films, and it even uses the name MacGuffin as an unseen character (or alias) who changes the protagonist's hotel room to a much higher floor. MacGuffin's name or relation to the other characters is not important but serves to exploit the protagonist's fear of heights ("high anxiety"), the overcoming of which is the protagonist's personal goal for the whole film.
  • The Double McGuffin (1979) and The McGuffin (1985) are noteworthy for the contextual use of the term in their titles. The first film does indeed involve two MacGuffins: a briefcase full of money and a dead body, both of which subsequently disappear.
  • In Repo Man (1984), the unknown item in the trunk of the car is a MacGuffin. [8]
  • In Reservoir Dogs (1992), the diamonds are a MacGuffin. [9]
  • In Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction (1994), the tantalizing golden glow emanating from the briefcase retrieved for Marsellus Wallace by Jules and Vincent (Jackson and Travolta) indicates a definitive MacGuffin. The wristwatch left to Butch by his late father is another: it is the retrieval of the briefcase and the wristwatch that drives the plot, but neither item impinges on the plotline at all in any other way than that they are objects of desire and pursuit for the cast of characters. [10]
  • The elemental stones in The Fifth Element (1997).
  • In Guy Ritchie's films Snatch, the diamond serves as a McGuffin, in that everybody in the movie wants it for some reason, but the item could be replaced with just about anything and the story would remain unaffected. Snatch is a particularly textbook example of a McGuffin, as the diamond is really significant only in the very first scene and becomes less and less important as the movie progresses. [11]
  • Ronin (1998) is an action/thriller that tells the story of a group of former intelligence agents who team up to steal a mysterious metal case which is a MacGuffin. The contents, if they exist, are never shown; the entire plot is not about the contents so much as what happens because of it. [12]
  • In his commentary for Dark City (1998), Roger Ebert analyzes Shell Beach as a MacGuffin.
  • MacGuffins are staple plot devices of the James Bond movies. For example, in For Your Eyes Only the MacGuffin is the ATAC, a stolen nuclear targeting computer. In The Man With the Golden Gun it is the Solex, a stolen device for converting sunlight into a laser beam. In Moonraker it is a phial of deadly nerve gas. In Octopussy it is a Fabergé egg. In The Spy Who Loved Me, it is a microfilm containing details of a system which can track nuclear submarines.
  • In the 1996 Mission Impossible movie, the CIA NOC list is a MacGuffin.[citation needed]
  • In Mission Impossible 3 (2006), the Rabbit's Foot is a MacGuffin.[13]
  • In The Recruit (2003), the computer virus labeled Ice Nine which is being sought by the character Al Pacino plays, is the MacGuffin.
  • In O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), the treasure that Everett, Pete, and Delmar are trying to get to is a MacGuffin and is actually acknowledged as such in the film when Everett admits that it doesn't exist. "We were chained together, I needed to tell you something to get you to come with me."[14]
  • In Snakes on a Plane (2006), the titular plot complication is brought about in an attempt by a notorious gangster to kill a witness to a murder. The gangster quickly becomes forgotten; whether or not he was actually convicted is left as a dangling plot thread.[15]

[edit] Television

  • Cheers : Sam Malone's Corvette is a MacGuffin that lasts throughout the entire television series' time. The audience rarely sees this Corvette but it is the focus of several episodes and is of the highest importance to Sam, often talked about in relation to Sam's own relationships, as it is revered by all characters, especially women in Sam's life. As far as the audience is concerned though, the fact that this object is a Corvette, or a car in general, is entirely irrelevant.
  • The whole premise of The Prisoner is built around a MacGuffin. The protagonist, Number Six, holds some "information". We are never told what this information is, or its significance to his captors, save that it includes the reason for Number Six's resignation (something which he claims is a matter of conscience and not open for discussion).
  • The Due South episode "Chicago Holiday" revolves around a list written on a matchbook that will allegedly give the owner control of the entire west side of Chicago. It is never explained what the list includes. At one point, a cleaning woman in a hotel disposes of the matchbook. As she leaves the hotel, another cleaning woman says to her, "Goodnight, Mrs. MacGuffin."
  • An episode of the Animated series G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero was centers around G.I Joe's efforts to prevent Cobra from unleashing a weapon known as the MacGuffin Device. When activated the device appeared to induce disorientation and vertigo, but it could have been any kind of super weapon.
  • In the Teen Titans episode "Revved Up," Robin races for the contents of a briefcase that was stolen from him. In the end, the contents are revealed to his friends, but the viewer does not see it; as the case is opened, the show cuts to credits. [16]
  • In the episode "The Glazed McGuffin Affair" from The Adventures of Sam & Max: Freelance Police, the titular characters spend the entire episode harrassing a corporation owner who has discontinued Sam and Max' favorite food: the Glazed McGuffin. Naturally, it is never quite specified what these are or contain (though it is mentioned that they apparently contain more than the maximum amount of chicken feet allowed by the FDA) .
  • Firefly : Several episodes revolve entirely around an inconsequential or unknown cargo: Episode 1, "Serenity", portrays the illegal salvage and subsequent attempts to sell a crate of unknown brick-shaped objects (later revealed to be foodstuffs, though it should be noted that there was a specific reason for the cargo being foodstuffs). Episode 4, "Shindig", centers around Mal Reynolds attempting to impress a wealthy noble to pay the crew to ship an unidentified cargo offworld (at the episode's end this is revealed to be a herd of cows). Episode 7, "Jaynestown", chronicles similar efforts to sneak several crates of smuggled goods past the local guards, the contents of which are never revealed. [17]
  • The 1980s gameshow 3-2-1 often called some of the clue items for the later rounds MacGuffins.

[edit] Literature

  • The contents of the letter in "The Purloined Letter" by Edgar Allan Poe. The hero must try to recover the letter before the villain can reveal its contents — but the reader never learns what the contents are.
  • In Running Dog, a postmodern thriller by Don DeLillo, the characters are almost all in pursuit of a reputedly pornographic film shot during the last days of the Second World War in Hitler's bunker. The essential MacGuffin nothing-ness of this film (as noted by Hitchcock) also becomes evident.
  • Children's literature also depends on such devices. For example, in Freddy's Cousin Weedly by Walter R. Brooks, the animals are determined to keep Aunt Effie from taking Mr. and Mrs. Bean's silver teapot. The teapot is a MacGuffin.
  • In the series of novels, A Series of Unfortunate Events by Daniel Handler (Lemony Snicket), there are two MacGuffins. The first is the massive fortune owned by the Baudelaire parents, which is what allegedly motivates Count Olaf to chase after the Baudelaire orphans. Mr. Handler confirms that this MacGuffin was intentional through Sunny, the youngest Baudelaire, in the thirteenth book of the series, The End. As Count Olaf continues to scheme to acquire the Baudelaire fortune, Sunny says to him, "McGuffin," which is translated as "Your scheming means nothing in this place" (312). It was also hinted that the fortune was destroyed in a fire in the Hotel Denoument. The second is a sugar bowl, which several people seek throughout the later books. Its contents are never revealed.
  • In Robert Rankin's novel The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse, the two main characters discuss the importance of a MacGuffin in general, as part of an ongoing drinking game. There are as many MacGuffins in the story as there are plot twists. They include the spider assassins bodyform, the Tinto lookalike, and the key to the office of the late Bill Winkie.

[edit] Comics

  • In the Cerebus graphic novel Jaka's Story, Oscar attracts a new customer to the bar by painting a statue called a Guffin. Eventually, the Guffin is also what attracts the attention of the Cirinists, which sets the stage for the story's ending.
  • In Terminal City, the briefcase is a MacGuffin, because it leads and confronts every character on the city, and the reader never learns what's inside it. The last page of the series shows a man opening the briefcase, which has something glowing inside, and running away, leaving it.
  • The manga GetBackers is notable in that almost every story involves a MacGuffin. The most obvious example is the mysterious target of the Platinum Arc; the mysterious "IL" and the arms of the Venus de Milo also serve as MacGuffins, although somewhat more thematic ones.

[edit] Disputed Examples

  • The letters of transit in Casablanca are considered a MacGuffin by many, including Roger Ebert, as he notes in his audio commentary on the movie's DVD. [18] However, Dan Ramer of DVDFile.com argues, "The letters might be considered a Hitchcockian Macguffin, but they're more than that. A Macguffin is a distraction, a mechanism to provoke the story the filmmaker wants to tell; here they play a vital role. Like the stolen plans for the Death Star, they will provide the means for the film's resolution." [19]
  • On Citizen Kane's use of "Rosebud," reviewer Colin Jacobson writes, "I must disagree with those who regard it as a 'MacGuffin'. Popularized by Hitchcock, that term describes something that seems to be a key to the story but which really has little or nothing to do with the tale.... I felt that Rosebud really did offer a key to the story, however, due to its symbolic value.... Rosebud represents that vanished childhood and the love he can’t seem to regain, no matter how hard he tries to force it." [20]
  • In From Russia With Love (1964), the LEKTOR decoder is considered to be a MacGuffin by some, but other sources refer to it as less than a proper MacGuffin. [21]
  • The manga One Piece itself is titled after a MacGuffin, a treasure which has yet to be revealed, but moves the storyline. [22]

[edit] More information

[edit] See also

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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