Misdirection
From Free net encyclopedia
Misdirection is a form of deception, where one feints in a particular course, and then exploits the misled pursuer's mistake to escape, or remain undetected. The study of close-up magic is a wonderful introduction to misdirection. Without giving away any magic secrets, the limits of the human mind can be used to give the wrong picture and memory. The mind can only concentrate on one thing at a time. The magician uses this and the "victim's" picture of how the world is supposed to be, against him. Some of the results are most startling. A coin can actually be seen to dissolve in the air; and yet it was never there. The face of a card that was not seen is seen. Things can be torn that are not torn.
An example of misdirection in magic might be as simple as a magician rolling up his sleeves and saying "nothing up my sleeve" and then "magically" producing an object that in no conceivable way could have been "up his sleeve". The audience instinctively scrutinizes the magician's arms but ignores the location where the object-to-be-magically-produced is hidden.
Memory can be manipulated in this way: an audience member may "remember" a coin--- which, lying on the magician's palm, first wobbles and then stands on edge--- as having leaped or floated into the air, or any other exaggeration which the mind may make while being misdirected.
In such a way, a group of Jeeps with plywood coverings painted to resemble tanks may misdirect an enemy general into ignoring a fleet of trucks (which are actually tank transports disguised as grocery trucks, etc.) and paying close scrutiny to the movement and activity of the fake tanks. The real tanks, suddenly disembarked on his flank may be remembered by the general as appearing "out of thin air" as if by magic.
Among the very few magicians who have reseached and evolved misdirection techniques are: John Ramsay, Tommy Wonder, Juan Tamariz, Tom Stone, Tony Slydini, and Dai Vernon.
Misdirection is also a literary device in which an author suggests, either directly, using exposition, or, more frequently, indirectly, through dialogue, interior monologue, or another means, that an incident or an event has a cause other than its actual basis. For example, in their novel Dance of Death, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child use misdirection to suggest several possible causes for the falling of lumber and the occurrence of loud snapping sounds that Margo Green hears as she walks through museum exhibits in the wee hours of the morning. First she thinks that the sounds are made by boards that have chanced to fall over after construction crew workers have left them precariously balanced upon quitting the work of the day. Next, she supposes that the sounds are made by a night guard tripping over a loose board. Then, she wonders whether the sounds are made by someone playing a practical joke on her. None of these possibilities turns out to be the actual cause of the sounds. Similarly, Joss Whedon and the writers of the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer uses misdirection by making viewers think that the season's villain is one character (the "little bad") when, in fact, the antagonist turns out to be another, more dangerous, character, the "Big Bad." Movies also employ misdirection, as when, for example, in The Exorcist, the welts that rise upon the possessed girl's stomach, like other physical reactions, are blamed on physiological conditions; in reality, it turns out that they are the effects of the girl's demonic possession.
See also
- Secrecy
- The Art of War
- Swordfish (film) (recurring theme)