The MacGuffin

The MacGuffin is a plot device. Wiki: “The MacGuffin(McGuffin) is an object, device, or event that is necessary to the plot and the motivation of the characters, but insignificant, unimportant, or irrelevant in itself.

Director and producer Alfred Hitchcock popularized the term MacGuffin and the technique with his 1935 film The 39 Steps, an early example of the concept. Hitchcock explained the term MacGuffin in a 1939 lecture at Columbia University in New York City:

It might be a Scottish name, taken from a story about two men on a train. One man says, 'What's that package up there in the baggage rack?' And the other answers, 'Oh, that's a MacGuffin'. The first one asks, 'What's a MacGuffin?' '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 MacGuffin!' So you see that a MacGuffin is actually nothing at all.

Bob: But it is often something. In Pyscho, it’s the money stolen from the bank by a supporting character. In the Maltese Falcon, it’s the bird, which happens to be fake. In a romance, it could be a never-sent love letter, a lost charm, a mythical pearl. It drives the plot. Often it is a good substitute for horrible things happening to the hero or heroine, IMO. Why, because some stories are primarily interior driven. Since we need some action to propel the story and characters forward and something visual other than their pretty faces etc., the McGuffin serves as a focal point for the readers as an important reason to keep reading. There is some contention over whether the audience cares about the fate of the McGuffin. Hitchcock says no. Lucas says yes. I say it depends on how your story is written and what you hope to achieve. I like a novel in which there is a “b” story surrounding the McGuffin. In The Maltese Falcon, the bird represents greed and how far men will compromise their morals. So the “b” story is the corruption of men.

As my grandson informed me, it is important not to confuse the McGuffin with the McMuffin.

It’s a matter of taste.

I'm so tensed up

 

Verb Tenses exerpted from Grammarly

Verbs come in three tenses: past, present, and future. The past is used to describe things that have already happened (e.g., earlier in the day, yesterday, last week, three years ago). The present tense is used to describe things that are happening right now, or things that are continuous. The future tense describes things that have yet to happen (e.g., later, tomorrow, next week, next year, three years from now).

The following table illustrates the proper use of verb tenses:

Simple Present	Simple Past	Simple Future
I read nearly every day.	Last night, I read an entire novel.	I will read as much as I can this year.
Present Continuous	Past Continuous	Future Continuous
I am reading Shakespeare at the moment.	I was reading Edgar Allan Poe last night.	I will be reading Nathaniel Hawthorne soon.
Present Perfect	Past Perfect	Future Perfect
I have read so many books I can’t keep count.	I had read at least 100 books by the time I was twelve.	I will have read at least 500 books by the end of the year.
Present Perfect Continuous	Past Perfect Continuous	Future Perfect Continuous
I have been reading since I was four years old.	I had been reading for at least a year before my sister learned to read.	I will have been reading for at least two hours before dinner tonight.

I’ve been writing for years and never knew there were so many variations on tense. Typical critique group comments go something like get rid of “was” in was drinking and write drank. Something always bothered me about it but I did not protest. The bother was in the feeling that I wanted to show continuous action. Was is alos associated with passive verbs. She was devastated can be mistakenly changed into She devastated. This changes the meaning and should be avoided. Perhaps I’m not saying anything you don’t know but if this helps just one of my friends then this post will have been worth it.

Love in the Afternoon

My wife and I found an incredible classic movie on TCM called Love in the Afternoon starring an aging Gary Cooper and a twenty-something Audrey Hepburn.

As a writer, I loved the witty dialogue, far better dialogue than anything I have seen or read recently.

As a man, I fell in love with Audrey all over again, and in this movie, it is especially easy to do. Also, Audrey is especially vulnerable here as she puts her inexperienced heart on the line for a playboy.

Me as one of the editors of my manuscripts, how could I not watch a Billy Wilder film? The story exudes charm, wit, fantastic dialogue, location (Paris), romance, intrigue, suspense, comedic moments.

The first time you hear Audrey speak, it is simple, “PaPa,” said with her famous lilt. She’s responding to her father’s call, Maurice Chevalier. He’s a private investigator who has Gary Cooper, a dissolute aging American industrialist, sighted in his binoculars.

Maurice reports to the jealous husband who decides he’ll shoot Gary.

Audrey is against violence and stops the attempted murder in a most hilarious way. Gary later said about her non-violence, “What are you, some sort of religious nut?” I possibly paraphrased.

The film is in black and white but that does not diminish the extreme beauty of our heroine. Funny thing about a film full of funny things. She won’t give her name to Gary, so he describes her as not his type by calling her, “thin girl.”

I won’t give away the plot. This you could do easily online. It is much better to just find it and watch it.

Disclaimer: This is not a review. I believe beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I’d love to hear how you felt about this movie.

Speaking of movies; For the fourth of July I recommend Yankee Doodle Dandy, which is being shown on TCM this afternoon.