Narration within film, much like in theatre productions, typically involves a character detached from the story physically, as if it’s being retold by them, coined as a “Voice of God” style. Often narration is also done by a character featured in the film itself, such as Morgan Freeman within Darabont’s 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption, considered a first-person style. Narration is used this way to position the audience within the mind of a character, and to provide context in a more direct and simpler way. However, the narrator isn’t always a character that the audience can trust – sometimes known as the unreliable narrator – they’re a character that’s lost their credibility in the audiences eyes, whether it’s because they have been deceived by the narrator, or because of certain attributes to the way they talk or behave that makes them unreliable.

Another film including narration like this could be 2005’s Kiss Kiss Bang Bang – starring Robert Downey Jr. as both a separate character and narrator in the narrative, much like The Shawshank Redemption.