A Red Herring Walks into the Classroom
Not your usual suspect.
When everything is not as it seems
I have been asked to answer the little cliffhanger from the last Film Matters post:
“So... is a MacGuffin also a red herring?”
It is a fair question. Both terms sound equally mysterious. Both lead to some level of misdirection. Both feel like they belong in spy thrillers and detective stories, and they often do. But they are not the same thing.
A MacGuffin is what the characters care about, but the audience doesn’t need to.
A Red Herring is what the audience is led to care about, but is just a diversion.
One motivates the characters. The other misleads the audience. (And sometimes, they wear the same costume, especially when there’s an unreliable narrator involved.)
If you're looking for a quick way to tease this apart in class, ask:
“Who’s being tricked - the characters or the audience?”
If it’s the audience, it’s probably a red herring.
If it’s the character, it’s probably a plot device or a MacGuffin.
More soon. Probably involving sharks. Meanwhile, you should watch Infernal Affairs.
Years ago I made a silly detective cartoon and I named the suspicious character Red Mackerel. It was a joke just for me