A MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin or Maguffin) is a plot device that motivates the characters or advances the story, but has little or no actual relevance to the story. In cryptography, MacGuffin is a block cipher created in 1994 by Bruce Schneier and Matt Blaze at a Fast Software Encryption workshop. ... A plot device is an element introduced into a story to solely to advance or resolve the plot of 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: "[We] 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 most always the necklace and in spy stories it is most always the papers." Director Herbert Brenon with actress Alla Nazimova on the set of War Brides, 1916 A director is a person who directs the making of a film. ... A film producer creates the conditions for making movies. ... Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock KBE (August 13, 1899 â€“ April 29, 1980) was an iconic and highly influential British-born film director and producer who pioneered many techniques in the suspense and thriller genres. ... The Oxford English Dictionary print set The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is a dictionary published by the Oxford University Press (OUP), and is the most successful dictionary of the English language, (not to be confused with the one-volume Oxford Dictionary of English, formerly New Oxford Dictionary of English, of... Alma Mater Columbia University is a private university in the United States and a member of the Ivy League. ...

Description

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The element that distinguishes a MacGuffin from other types of plot devices is that it is not important what the object specifically is. Anything that serves as a motivation will do. The MacGuffin might even be ambiguous. Its importance is accepted by the story's characters, but it does not actually have any effect on the story. It can be generic or left open to interpretation. Image File history File links Question_book-3. ...

The MacGuffin is common in films, especially thrillers. Commonly, though not always, it is the central focus of the film in the first act, and later declines in importance as the struggles and motivations of characters play out. Sometimes the MacGuffin is all but forgotten by the end of the film. This article is about motion pictures. ... The thriller is a broad genre of literature, film, and television. ... In theater, an act (noun) is a short performance that is part of a longer program. ...

Because a MacGuffin is, by definition, basically unimportant to the story, its use can challenge the audience's suspension of disbelief. Well-done works will compensate for this with a story, characters, acting/writing, and other elements that appeal to the audiences. In the case of an ambiguous MacGuffin, audiences can imagine what it is or ignore it and just go along with the story. This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

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. Pearl Fay White, born March 4, 1889 in Green Ridge, Missouri, United States - died August 4, 1938 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, was a singer and star of silent film. ... The Perils of Pauline was a silent movie serial which debuted in 1914. ... DVD front cover for The Adventures of Captain Marvel, one of the most celebrated serials for both Republic Pictures and of the sound era in general. ...

Interviewed in 1966 by François Truffaut, Alfred Hitchcock illustrated the term "MacGuffin" with this story: François Roland Truffaut (French IPA: ) (February 6, 1932 – October 21, 1984) was one of the founders of the French New Wave in filmmaking, and remains an icon of the French film industry. ...

"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." This article is about the country. ... For other uses, see Lion (disambiguation). ... Lowland-Highland divide Highland Sign with welcome in English and Gaelic The Scottish Highlands (A Ghàidhealtachd in Gaelic) include the rugged and mountainous regions of Scotland north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault. ...

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] Richard Warren Schickel (b. ...

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!"^{[citation needed]}

Problems with defining MacGuffins

Not all people involved in the film industry use the term MacGuffin in precisely the same manner. On the commentary soundtrack to the 2004 DVD release of Star Wars, writer and director George Lucas describes R2-D2 as "the main driving force of the movie ... what you say in the movie business is the MacGuffin ... the object of everybody's search".^[2] In contrast to the definition of the term attributed to Hitchcock where the MacGuffin serves merely to motivate the characters but otherwise has no significance, R2-D2 is an important character in his own right and carries information critical to the development of the plot.^{[citation needed]} This movie poster for Star Wars depicts many of the films important elements, such as Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, X-Wing and Y-Wing fighters Star Wars, retitled Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope in 1981 (see note at Title,) is the original (and in chronological... Screenwriters, scenarists, or script writers, are authors who write the screenplays from which movies and television programs are made. ... Director Herbert Brenon with actress Alla Nazimova on the set of War Brides, 1916 A director is a person who directs the making of a film. ... George Walton Lucas, Jr. ... R2-D2 (called R2, or Artoo for short), is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe. ...

Noted film critic Roger Ebert has also used the term to describe an artifact known as the Allspark in the film Transformers as "an alien MacGuffin," the purpose of which "doesn't much matter."^[3] In this instance, Ebert's definition of the Allspark differs from Hitchcock's use of the term; the Allspark is important, though (according to him) for reasons insignificant to the rest of the film.^{[citation needed]} Film criticism is the analysis and evaluation of films, individually and collectively. ... Roger Joseph Ebert (born June 18, 1942) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American film critic. ... For the 1986 animated film, see The Transformers: The Movie. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Examples

Films

• The letters of transit in Casablanca.^[4]
• The eponymous statuette in The Maltese Falcon (1941).^[5]
• The unknown contents of the briefcase in Pulp Fiction (1994). ^[6]
• The case in Ronin (1998). ^[7]
• The video tape in The Life of David Gale (2003).^[8]
• The formula in David Mamet's The Spanish Prisoner (1998)^[9]

For other uses, see Casablanca (disambiguation). ... The Maltese Falcon is a 1941 Warner Brothers film written and directed by John Huston, based on the novel of the same name by Dashiell Hammett, and starring Humphrey Bogart as private investigator Sam Spade, Mary Astor as his femme fatale client, Sydney Greenstreet in his film debut, and Peter... Pulp Fiction is a 1994 film by director Quentin Tarantino, who cowrote the film with Roger Avary. ... DVD cover Ronin is a 1998 film which tells the story of a group of former intelligence agents who team up to steal a mysterious metal case. ... The Life of David Gale is a 2003 motion picture that tells the fictional story of a philosophy professor, David Gale, who was dedicated to the abolition of the death penalty and who was sentenced to death for the rape and murder of a colleague and fellow abolitionist. ... This article is about the movie. ...

Television

• The Rambaldi device in Alias ^[10]
• Krieger Waves [1] in Star Trek: The Next Generation (TV series) ^[11][12]
• The Numbers in Lost

A Mueller device is a mysterious piece of technology in the US television series, Alias. ... Alias is an American Spy-fi television series created by J. J. Abrams which was broadcast on ABC from September 30, 2001 to May 22, 2006, spanning five seasons. ... Star Trek: The Next Generation (ST:TNG, TNG) is a science fiction television series, part of the Star Trek universe created by Gene Roddenberry. ... LOST redirects here. ...

Literature

• The TV set in Wu Ming's novel 54.^[13][14]

• The container in William Gibson's "Spook Country".^[15]

Wu Ming Wu Ming (Chinese for Anonymous) is a pseudonym for a group of Italian authors formed in 2000 from a subset of the Luther Blissett community in Bologna. ... 54 — Heinemann hardcover edition 54 is a novel by Wu Ming first published in Italian in 2002. ... For other persons named William Gibson, see William Gibson (disambiguation). ...

Comics

• The eponymous treasure in the manga One Piece.^[16]

Serialized in Weekly Shonen Jump Shonen Jump Original run August 4, 1996 – (ongoing) Volumes 47 volumes with 479 chapters TV anime Director Konosuke Uda Munehisa Sakai Studio Toei Animation Network Fuji TV GMA 7 Original run October 20, 1999 – (ongoing) Episodes Japanese: 332 of 334 (current) English: 112 of 113...

Video Games

• The "Philosopher's Legacy" in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops

Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (commonly abbreviated MGS3) is a stealth-based game directed by Hideo Kojima, developed and published by Konami for the PlayStation 2. ...

See also

• Unexposed Contents
• Big Dumb Object
• Quest

Unexposed contents is a film device originally used primarily in Avant-garde film but that has penetrated into the mainstream during the 1980s and 1990s. ... A term probably coined by reviewer Roz Kaveney[1] and used in discussing science fiction, a Big Dumb Object (BDO) is a mysterious artifact (usually of extraterrestrial or otherwise unknown origin) in a story which generates an intense sense of wonder just by being there; to a certain extent, the... This article is about the word, for other meanings see Quest (disambiguation) A quest is a journey towards a goal with great meaning and is used in mythology and literature as a plot device. ...

References

is the 186th day of the year (187th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) is the current year, a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar and the AD/CE era in the 21st century. ... Aljean Harmetz is a Hollywood journalist and film historian. ... Alan Barnes, 17, was reported missing from Adelaide, Australia in June 1979. ... is the 52nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 88th day of the year (89th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Also see: 2002 (number). ... is the 175th day of the year (176th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 192nd day of the year (193rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Further reading

• Francois Truffaut. Hitchcock
• Slavoj Zizek. Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Lacan (But Were Afraid to Ask Hitchcock)'
• Slavoj Zizek. The Sublime Object of Ideology

External links

• A.Word.A.Day — McGuffin, from the website of an amateur linguist who edited a book (ISBN 0-471-23032-4) assembled from the site's material
• FAQs Page of the Hitchcock Scholars/'MacGuffin' website
• Spielberg, Lucas, Ford Interview about Indiana Jones IV — in which George Lucas repeatedly refers to a mysterious McGuffin.