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 went back to it, you realized all the now-obvious clues had been there undermining the story all along? You’re not alone. Those clues are a form 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 right up to the end.

Foreshadowing

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

Before we look at examples of foreshadowing in film, we first need 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 end of a film or novel. Writers often use foreshadowing early in a story to set up what comes later. “Hinting” and “foretelling” 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.

• Creating suspense
• Dramatic buildup
• Building anticipation

Two Types of Foreshadowing

Now that you know the definition of foreshadowing, you might already be thinking of examples from books or films that come immediately to mind. All of those examples fall into one of two types of foreshadowing.

Direct foreshadowing is when an element in the story clearly and explicitly suggests what is going to happen. This can be done through dialogue, a narrator, or a prophecy within the story.

An example of direct foreshadowing can be found in Macbeth.

In the opening, Shakespeare has the three witches explicitly state Macbeth’s fate—that he “shalt be king hereafter”—but that Banquo will be the father of future kings.

This is a clever use of direct foreshadowing because it gives us information while also making us, along with the characters, want to know more. Why will Macbeth become king if Banquo’s line ultimately takes the throne?

Indirect foreshadowing is when an element in the story hints at future events by leaving subtle clues about what will happen. These hints are not obvious and are only fully understood after the events they point to have occurred.

Of Mice and Men is a strong example.

Throughout the book, there are references to Lennie accidentally killing things when he pets them. This lays the groundwork for the climactic moment between Lennie and Curley’s wife.

Although there may be two ways to define foreshadowing, both can effectively serve the same purpose when used well. The core of the technique is capturing and guiding the audience’s attention.

Foreshadowing and Other Devices

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

Chekhov’s gun is a very famous form of foreshadowing. The device, named after Anton Chekhov’s work, can be summed up as: if a gun appears at the beginning of a story, it must be fired by the end.

The point of the rule is that any detail you emphasize early on should come back later and matter. Sound familiar? That’s foreshadowing.

A red herring uses the audience’s familiarity with foreshadowing against them. Suppose we see a gun hidden under a pillow in Act I—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 a story element designed to lead us in one direction so that we’ll be surprised later.

Foreshadowing hints at the future; a flash-forward shows us the future. But a flash-forward can be vague enough that it functions 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

Before there was foreshadowing in film, there was foreshadowing in books. Writers of any genre can learn from the following examples.

In Shakespeare’s famous tragedy Romeo and Juliet, there are several moments of foreshadowing. Romeo says, “Come death, and welcome. Juliet wills it so.” This (rather obviously) foreshadows the fate of Romeo and his lover.

Juliet also dreams of Romeo dead at the bottom of a tomb. This likewise foreshadows that things are not going to end well.

The ending of The Monkey’s Paw is also quite grim, and it doesn’t come without warning. The man who owned the magic talisman before Mr. White warns him: “I threw it on the fire. If you keep it, don’t blame me for what happens. Like a sensible man, throw it back in the fire again.”

Most readers, seeing this, will be on alert, worried that things are going to get worse.

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

Examples of Foreshadowing in Film

Although there are mainly two types of foreshadowing, filmmakers have found ways to use almost every tool of filmmaking to foreshadow story events—from the movie’s title to the characters’ costumes. Analyzing and breaking down some of these examples can help you spot foreshadowing opportunities in your own stories that you might never have noticed before.

Sometimes, a film’s title itself foreshadows the story. This form of foreshadowing has to be vague enough to spark curiosity before the audience watches the film, but clear enough that they understand it once the credits roll. The Coen brothers achieved this perfectly with their 2007 film No Country for Old Men.

The title, taken from novelist and screenwriter Cormac McCarthy’s work, hints that Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) is no longer suited to deal with the new generation of criminals he encounters.

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

Fight Club is one of the most notable plot-twist films in recent years. On a second or third viewing, you may notice subtle clues throughout 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 know the film is full of twists and that almost all of the main characters die. But did you know director Martin Scorsese left very explicit clues about which characters would die? Drawing from the 1932 film Scarface, Scorsese places an “X” in the frame of shots featuring characters who will later be killed.

This classic “whodunit” keeps audiences curious and absorbed right up to the last moment. How? The Usual Suspects deftly balances subtle, indirect foreshadowing with quick, direct foreshadowing beats scattered throughout the film, tying all the plot threads together. The result is a plot twist that still ranks among the best more than twenty years later.

The film’s incredible final scene has been replicated and parodied for years, largely because of how effectively it pulls together all the foreshadowing clues to close the story.

The Prestige is another excellent example, weaving in enough foreshadowing to keep viewers engaged without giving away its major twists. One of the film’s best scenes shows Alfred performing the birdcage trick, in which he kills a bird and then makes it reappear.

Foreshadowing is one of the most effective tools filmmakers have for sparking curiosity and holding an audience’s attention. But it’s important to understand how much foreshadowing your story needs and which kind. Too much foreshadowing can make a story predictable and cost you the audience’s interest. Too little can make it boring or confusing, which also drives them away.

Try looking for moments in your own story where you can incorporate some foreshadowing techniques and see which ones work for you.