Re: Favorite Voice-Over Narrations
The absolute best movie narration I've ever experienced was that by virtually unknown actor Gil Stratton who played a minor character in and did the narration for the great POW film, Stalag 17, in 1953. Stratton played Cookie, the go-for and closest thing to a friend of prison wheeler-dealer Sefton (played by William Holden). So we get the story through Cookie's recollections--not being a major participant, he didn't see everything or know everything, but he was a keen observer of what went on around him such as when the "Geneva man" from the Red Cross provides the prisoners with several boxes of ping-pong balls, which Cookie hints, really turned out useful later on. Great narration! Held the whole film together.
And speaking of Bill Holden, don't forget his voice-over opening of Sunset Blvd. (1950) as we're watching his dead body floating in that swimming pool! Good stuff!
Richard Basehart was a primary character and narrator of Moby Dick (1956). Both the book and the film open with the same line, "Call me Ishmael," and Basehart then proceeds to recite Melville's wonderful description of all trickles of water leading first to streams, then creeks, and rivers, and finally to the sea, drawing adventurers along with them.
The World War II film, Battle Cry also benefitted from a strong narration by James Whitmore, a really good actor with a great voice.
Another great voice that would seem to have been perfect for narration was that of Orson Welles. He did a good job in narrating the classic Western, Duel in the Sun (1946) but was less impressive, I thought, as narrator for Mel Brooks' History of the World, Part One.
Everybody knows Spencer Tracy narrated How the West Was Won (1962). But how many remember that James Cagney narrated two films during his retirement, between his last starring role in One, Two, Three (1961) and his featured part in Ragtime (1981). Would you believe Cagney narrated The Ballad of Smokey the Bear (1966) and Arizona Bushwhackers (1968), which I remember as a bad B-grade movie by Audey Murphy. Of course, Cagney's the guy who brought war hero Murphy to Hollywood and helped him get a start in the movies, so that might explain it.
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