Every movie has a MacGuffin – the thing that instigates the action and drives the characters’ motivation. Sometimes the MacGuffin is obvious. Other times it is not. That’s when you need The MacGuffin Report. (Cue theme music.)
Everyone in the world but me went bananas for The Hangover. Even women. So there must be something lurking within the film making it appealing. (Other than Iron Mike Tyson.) That is, unless the film really works like a time-delayed narcotic agent that causes impaired judgment and faulty memory.
One might think the MacGuffin in The Hangover is the missing groom played by Justin Bartha, or the longing for male companionship epitomized by Zach Galifianakis, or perhaps the “Holocaust ring” that Ed Helms accidentally gives to Heather Graham. No, the MacGuffin is Flunitrazepam.
This chemical compound, also known as Rohypnol or “Roofies” is proscribed by doctors to treat severe insomnia, but can do wonders when mixed with Sunny D if you want those lousy kids to stop playing in your yard.
If the central conceit of The Hangover is to “playback the events of last night,” then surely the instigating event is the drugs Galifianakis slipped in their drinks. It’s a little (ahem) hazy, because we only discover that the MacGuffin is Roofies because the act of discovery is inherent to the nature of this particular MacGuffin. By this logic, Todd Phillips is mining the same ore as Christopher Nolan. Or Werner Heisenberg, for that matter.
Yes, America, we have a scapegoat. All the boisterous tooth-ripping, elevator-fellating, stripper-betrothing antics can be blamed on the accidental Roofies - not the totally safe and legal Ecstasy that Galifianakis wanted to use to spike everyone’s drink. Explain to me why women loved this movie again?
