Why is it called a MacGuffin?
The first person to use MacGuffin as a word for a plot device was Alfred Hitchcock. He borrowed it from an old shaggy-dog story in which some passengers on a train interrogate a fellow passenger carrying a large, strange-looking package.
What is the MacGuffin in Rebecca?
the death of
The MacGuffin is the death of Rebecca. Or, even more precisely, the question as to how she died.
Is a MacGuffin bad?
The MacGuffin is often held up as an example of bad writing, as if the item in question must be interchangeable because the author is lazy or unimaginative, but that isn’t necessarily the case. This makes it ideal for stories that are about the process of acquiring the MacGuffin, rather than the item itself.
What is a MacGuffin example?
A MacGuffin is a plot device that either serves as a catalyst for the action in a story. Typically, a MacGuffin will not have any identity of its own, and it can be interchangeable. For example, Pulp Fiction has the shining briefcase, but the briefcase could’ve been anything. It could have been a safe or envelope.
Is McGuffin Scottish?
McGuffin is a surname of Irish origin, thought to originate from County Donegal. It is an Anglicized form of the Gaelic Mag Dhuibhfinn.
What is the MacGuffin in Casablanca?
letters of transit
In Casablanca (1942), the iconic wartime romance in which Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman play star-crossed lovers, the MacGuffin is the coveted “letters of transit” that allow free travel through Nazi-occupied countries.
What is Alfred Hitchcock’s MacGuffin?
Hitchcock explained the term “MacGuffin” 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 almost always the necklace and in spy stories it is most always the papers.
Are Horcruxes MacGuffins?
The Horcruxes (Harry Potter) The Horcruxes in the latter Harry Potter movies aren’t just one but seven MacGuffins that all work together. These MacGuffins are implied to exist throughout all eight movies, but the first one makes its appearance as Tom Riddle’s Diary in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
Does every story have a Mcguffin?
Every well-crafted story has a MacGuffin, a red-herring, that hooks the reader and creates an unceasing desire in them to dive head-first into the story. To work properly a MacGuffin must follow a strict set of rules.
Is the ark a MacGuffin?
The MacGuffin is a plot device in fiction that drives the action forward. The Ark of the Covenant, the MacGuffin of Raiders of the Lost Ark. For Lucas, the Ark was the perfect MacGuffin, but struggled to conceptualize suitable follow-ups on his own for the subsequent three sequels.
How do patterns operate in the chase scene in DW Griffith’s Way Down East?
How do patterns operate in the chase scene in D. W. Griffith’s Way Down East? Parallel editing is used to make different lines of action appear to be occurring simultaneously. A specific editing pattern used throughout the film is at first employed and then broken, thus thwarting viewer expectations.