MacGuffin – Answers
After guessing how many movies you could identify from their MacGuffin or other key artifact depicted in Ann Huey’s painting, check your answers below to see how many you got right.
Movie, Year – Director, MacGuffin or Other Artifact
1 – The Birds, 1963 – Alfred Hitchcock
Why are the birds attacking?
2 – It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, 1963 – Stanley Kramer
The “big W” – palm trees forming a W where the treasure is buried.
3 – North By Northwest, 1959 – Alfred Hitchcock
Crop duster that tries to mow down Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant).
Figurine in Phillip Vandamm’s (James Mason) living room.
Mt. Rushmore, where a murder is staged, and the climactic chase scene takes place.
Matchbook of Roger O. Thornhill–the O stands for nothing.
4 – Various movies: The Lady Vanishes, Murder on the Orient Express, Strangers on a Train, North by Northwest, and so on.
Many movies have plots that play out on trains.
5 – Rear Window, 1954 – Alfred Hitchcok
Apartment building where Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) lives, watches his trunk being moved out.
Moving van that carries a deceased Mrs. Thorwald.
Binoculars that bored and broken-legged Jeff (James Stewart) uses to watch his neighbors.
Lisa (Grace Kelly) becomes alarmed when Mrs. Thorwald’s alligator handbag is left suspiciously behind after she disappears.
6 – The Trouble with Harry, 1954 – Alfred Hitchcock
Everyone thinks they killed Harry (Philip Truex)!
7 – Spellbound, 1945 – Alfred Hitchcock
Amnesiac Dr. Anthony Edwardes/John Ballantyne (Gregory Peck) freaks out whenever he sees the color white with lines on or through it. The lines subconsciously remind him of the accidental death of his brother in childhood, for which he feels guilt. Psychiatrist/love interest Dr. Constance Petersen (Ingrid Bergman) helps cure him.
8 – The Lady Vanishes, 1938 – Alfred Hitchcock
A lamp on a table in the train where “the lady vanishes.”
9 – Dial M for Murder, 1954 – Alfred Hitchcock
Telephone that Margot (Grace Kelly) answers just before her unsuccessful murder.
Scissors that figure in Margot’s murder attempt, the death of her attacker, Swann/Lesgate (Anthony Dawson), who was coerced into committing the murder by her nasty husband Tony (Ray Milland).
Latch key that figures in the eventual arrest of the nasty husband.
Trophy of nasty husband, a former tennis champion.
10 – The Maltese Falcon, 1941 – John Huston
The Maltese Falcon itself, aka “The Black Bird”, whose jewels, secreted under black wax, were sought by all.
11 – Romancing the Stone, 1984 – Robert Zemeckis
“El Corazón” (The Heart), a priceless emerald that everyone was searching, and killing for.
12 – The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, 2001-2003 – Peter Jackson
The One Ring is a magical, malevolent ring of power, only destructible by tossing into the volcanic pit of Mount Doom, where it was forged.
13 – Frenzy, 1972 – Alfred Hitchcock
The jeweled stickpin that the “Necktie Murderer (or Strangler)” Robert Rusk (Barry Foster) wears.
The necktie of the “Necktie Murderer”.
14 – Vertigo, 1958 – Alfred Hitchcock
The necklace worn by Carlotta Valdes in the portrait and by Judy (Kim Novak), that exposes her as a fraud and imposter.
The haunting portrait of Carlotta.
The bouquet pictured in the portrait that Madeleine (Kim Novak) buys a facsimile of on her mysterious, unremembered walks.
The fall that then-policeman Scottie (James Stewart) took that caused his vertigo.
The dreamy “vertigo” green that envelopes the screen when Judy, as Madeleine, appears.
15 – Titanic, 1997 – James Cameron
“The Heart of the Ocean”, Rose’s (Kate Winslett) priceless blue diamond necklace, that was thought lost and possibly found in the sunken remains of the Titanic.
16 – Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, 2001 – Chris Columbus
The Sorcerer’s (or Philosopher’s) Stone has magical powers.
17 – Murder on the Orient Express, (1974 – Sidney Lumet) (2017, Kenneth Branagh)
Train tickets.
18 – Psycho, 1960 – Alfred Hitchcock
The newspaper in which Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) wraps the stolen $40,000.
One of Norman Bates’ (Anthony Perkins) taxidermied birds displayed in the office of the Bates Motel.
19 – Strangers on a Train, 1951 – Alfred Hitchcock
The lighter given by Anne (Ruth Roman) to tennis champ Guy (Farley Granger).
The glasses worn by Guy’s estranged wife, who is murdered by Bruno (Robert Walker), the unhinged “stranger on a train”.
20 – Marnie, 1964 – Alfred Hitchcock
When Marnie (Tippi Hedren) sees red, she “sees red”!
Red ink that Marnie accidentally spills.
Red gladioli that send Marnie into a tailspin.
21 – To Catch a Thief, 1955 – Alfred Hitchcock
The black cat represents now-retired John Robie, “The Cat” (Cary Grant), a famous cat burglar, who stole for the French Resistance during WWII, and who may be stealing jewels again.
22 – The Man Who Knew Too Much, 1956 – Alfred Hitchcock
Doris Day as “Jo” McKenna, sings her signature “Que Sera, Sera” in a very loud voice, at the foreign embassy, to let her kidnapped son know his mother and father (James Stewart) are coming to rescue him.
23 – The 39 Steps, 1935 – Alfred Hitchcock
Mr. Memory (Wylie Watson) has all the secret formulas in his brain.
“The 39 Steps” aren’t in any staircase, but is an organization of spies.
24 – Family Plot, 1976 – Alfred Hitchcock
Ransom in the form of a priceless diamond hangs in plain sight on the chandelier.
25 – Citizen Kane, 1941 – Orson Welles
Who or what is “Rosebud”, the last word uttered by mogul Charles Foster Kane (Orson Welles) just before he died?
26 – Alfred Hitchcock movies
Alfred Hitchcock always included his signature self-cameo in his movies.
27 – A “red herring” is a false clue.
28 – Stagefright, 1950 – Alfred Hitchcock
The blood-stained dress is the evidence that links Charlotte (Marlene Dietrich) and Jonathan (Richard Todd) to the murder of her husband.
29 – Raiders of the Lost Ark, 1981 – Steven Spielberg
The golden idol Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) steals, is then stolen by rival treasure hunter Belloq (Paul Freeman), setting into motion an adventure of Biblical proportions!
30 – Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Fisher King, Excalibur, The DaVinci Code, and so on.
The “Holy Grail” makes an excellent MacGuffin. It’s a frequent and favorite quest-driven subject of mysteries, adventures, and fantasies.
31 – Saboteur, 1942 – Alfred Hitchcock
The climactic, stomach-lurching scene where good guy and accused saboteur, Barry Kane (Robert Cummings), and bad guy Frank Fry, the actual saboteur (Norman Lloyd), have a knock-down, drag-out in Lady Liberty’s torch.
32 – Rebecca, 1940 – Alfred Hitchcock
Rebecca, the deceased wife of Maxim de Winter (Laurence Olivier) who haunts him and his fragile, nameless new wife (Joan Fontaine).
33 – Pulp Fiction, 1994 – Quentin Tarantino
The mysterious glowing briefcase! What the heck is in it?! Other than an homage to 1955’s noir Kiss Me Deadly, where the glowing box likely stored something radioactive—no one knows.
34 – The Big Lebowski, 1998 – Joel Coen
The rug that is stolen from “The Dude” Lebowski (Jeff Bridges)… You know, the one that “tied the room together?”
35 – Rope, 1948 – Alfred Hitchcock
The trunk where a body may or may not be hidden. Is it a lovely lace-draped buffet or… a coffin? A tense game of cat-and-mouse unfolds between Leopold and Loeb-like psycho killers Phillip (Farley Granger) and Brandon (John Dall) and amateur detective/professor, Rupert Cadell (James Stewart).
Rope used to tie some books together could also be the murder weapon!
36 – Notorious, 1946 – Alfred Hitchcock
Nazi uranium ore is hidden inside wine bottles and discovered by agents T.R. Devlin (Cary Grant) and Alicia Huberman (Ingrid Bergman).
37 – Casablanca, 1942 – Michael Curtiz
Everyone wants out of Vichy-controlled Casablanca and the “letters of transit” are the way.
38 – Various Movies
MacGuffins are frequently and sometimes intentionally vague, like “secret” codes, formulas and plans.
