What Is Foreshadowing – Examples in Film and Literature

Have you ever watched a movie or read a book where a plot twist completely shocked you, but when you revisited it, you realized all the now-obvious clues had been subverting the story all along? You’re not alone. Those clues are a kind of foreshadowing, a powerful storytelling technique that helps make an ending—no matter how wild—feel earned. Using foreshadowing in your story can create anticipation and keep your audience engaged until the very end.

Foreshadowing

When used well, foreshadowing can be extremely effective in drawing in an audience. If it’s too obvious, they may lose interest. If it’s too subtle, they may miss it entirely.

Before we look at examples of foreshadowing in film, we first need to be able to define foreshadowing and its function. What is foreshadowing to begin with? How does it help you tell your story?

What Is Foreshadowing?

Foreshadowing is a literary device used to hint at or suggest future events in a story. It can be a very effective tool for building curiosity, intrigue, suspense, or even a sense of narrative harmony by the time a film or novel ends. Writers often use foreshadowing early in a story to set up later events. “Hinting” and “predicting” are both synonyms for foreshadowing. While you can categorize types of foreshadowing based on how subtle or direct they are, its primary function is to capture the audience’s attention.

• Create suspense
• Build dramatic tension
• Foster anticipation

Two Types of Foreshadowing

Now that you know the definition of foreshadowing, you might immediately think of some examples from books or films that come to mind. All of these fall into one of two types of foreshadowing.

Direct foreshadowing is when an element in the story explicitly suggests an upcoming event. This can be done through dialogue, a narrator, or a prophecy within the story.

One example of direct foreshadowing can be found in Macbeth.

Shakespeare opens with three witches clearly stating Macbeth’s fate—that he “shalt be king hereafter”—while Banquo will be the father of future kings.

This is a clever use of direct foreshadowing because it gives us information while making both us and the characters want to know more. Why will Macbeth become king, yet Banquo’s line will ultimately take the throne?

Indirect foreshadowing is when elements of the story hint at upcoming events through subtle clues about what is going to happen. These hints are less obvious and are fully understood only once the events they foreshadow actually occur.

Of Mice and Men is a great example.

Throughout the book, there are repeated mentions of Lennie accidentally killing things he pets. This sets up the climactic moment between Lennie and Curley’s wife.

Although there may be two ways to define foreshadowing, both can effectively accomplish the same goal when used well. Capturing the audience’s attention lies at the heart of using this technique.

Foreshadowing and Other Devices

Foreshadowing is often confused with many other literary devices, or used to refer to them. Let’s look at some terms commonly associated with foreshadowing.

Chekhov’s gun is a very famous type of foreshadowing. The device refers to Anton Chekhov’s advice that if a gun appears at the beginning of a story, it must be fired by the end.

The point of the rule is that the details you highlight early in a story should pay off later. Sound familiar? That’s foreshadowing.

Red herrings use the audience’s familiarity with foreshadowing against them. Suppose we see a gun hidden under a pillow in the first act—we’ll assume this is foreshadowing that the gun will be used later. If the gun turns out to be fake or is never used at all, that’s a red herring. A red herring is an element of the story designed to lead us in one direction so we’ll be surprised later.

Foreshadowing hints at the future; a flashforward shows us the future. But a flashforward can be vague enough that it serves as foreshadowing. For example, we see a close-up of someone pulling a gun from under a pillow, but we don’t know who it is or why they’re doing it, and then we cut back to events before that reveal. That’s foreshadowing.

Examples of Foreshadowing in Literature

Foreshadowing appeared in books long before it appeared in films. Writers of any genre can learn from the following examples.

Shakespeare’s famous tragedy Romeo and Juliet includes several instances of foreshadowing. Romeo says, “Then love-devouring Death do what he dare, / It is enough I may but call her mine.” This (quite clearly) hints at the fate awaiting Romeo and his beloved.

Juliet also dreams of Romeo dead in a tomb. This too foreshadows that something very bad is coming.

The ending of The Monkey’s Paw is also grim, and it doesn’t come without warning. The man who previously owned the magical talisman warns Mr. White: “I threw it on the fire. If you keep it, don’t blame me for what happens. Like a sensible man, let it burn.”

After reading this, most readers grow more alert and anxious that things are going to get worse.

Here’s another bleak story. John Steinbeck foreshadows (spoiler alert) Lennie’s fate in his famous work. In the book, a character talks in detail about how animals too weak to survive in this harsh world should be killed for their own good. As the story progresses, George comes to believe that Lennie may fit that description as well.

Examples of Foreshadowing in Film

Although there are mainly two types of foreshadowing, filmmakers have found ways to use nearly every tool in filmmaking to foreshadow their stories—from film titles to costume design. Analyzing and breaking down some of these examples will help you spot opportunities for foreshadowing in your own stories that you might not have noticed before.

Sometimes the title of a film itself can foreshadow its plot. This method of foreshadowing has to be vague enough to spark curiosity before the audience watches, while making sense once the credits roll. The Coen brothers did this perfectly with their 2007 film No Country for Old Men.

The title was created by writer and screenwriter Cormac McCarthy to suggest that Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) no longer belongs in the world of the new generation of criminals he encounters.

“When you can’t sleep, nothing seems real anymore.”

Fight Club is one of the most notable twist-ending films in recent years. If you’ve seen it a second or even third time, you may notice subtle clues throughout the film that foreshadow the fact that Tyler Durden (played by Brad Pitt) isn’t real, including this line of voice-over.

If you’ve seen The Departed, you’ll know the film is full of twists and almost every main character dies—but did you know director Martin Scorsese left very explicit clues about which characters would die? Borrowing from the 1932 film Scarface, Scorsese places an “X” in the frame in shots of characters who will end up dead.

This classic “whodunit” keeps its audience curious and engrossed until the very last moment. How? The Usual Suspects cleverly balances subtle, indirect foreshadowing throughout the film with quick, direct foreshadowing in certain scenes that ties everything together. The result is a plot twist that still ranks among the best more than twenty years later.

Its incredible final scene has been copied and parodied for years after its release, largely because of how effectively it pulls together all its foreshadowing clues to end the story.

The Prestige is an excellent example of including just enough foreshadowing to engage the audience without giving away its big twists. One of the film’s best scenes is Alfred performing the birdcage trick, in which he kills a bird and then brings it back to life.

Foreshadowing is one of the most effective tools filmmakers have to spark audience curiosity and hold their attention. However, it’s important to understand how much foreshadowing your story needs and which type to use. Too much foreshadowing can make a story predictable and cause audiences to lose interest. Too little can make it boring or confusing, which also drives them away.

Try identifying a few moments in your story where you can employ some foreshadowing techniques and see which ones work for you.