I read lots of books as a child, and the protagonists - Laura Ingalls Wilder, Dorothy Gale, Scarlett O'Hara and countless others - still live in my mind, heart and imagination. But one heroine's story continues to echo through my work as a writer, and my heritage as a Jewish woman. I've written about her and been inspired by her countless times (including, most recently, here at Beliefnet). Anne Frank lives, not just in my heart, but in the collective of humanity. The irony of course is that she lives, because she died. And because she died - and because a fissure in humanity was to blame for her death - we are compelled to revisit Anne's attic, in print, and on film.
The latest trip back to the secret annex is the critically acclaimed BBC miniseries, now being released in two different editions: the movie edition and the miniseries edition. While the elements of the story and the characters are the same, there are small touches that show you a different side to living in the annex.
Gone is whatever gloss there might have been on the experience of living as a self-contained society above Otto Frank's business in Amsterdam; in this version, you see the moments that the original film and Broadway show deemed unfit for the world to see, because they depicted Anne as an awkward teen going through puberty. Anne's narrative in this version - the only film version approved by the Anne Frank Fonds - is more authentic, more unexpurgated, and better depicts the awkward struggles of a girl becoming a woman under extreme circumstances. Particularly striking is the tense relationship between Anne and her mother, and the long moments that the camera spends capturing the awkwardness of new arrival Mr. Dussel as Anne's new roommate. Those two relationships in particular illustrate Anne's alienation - even within the close quarters, she really feels alone..
This version is different than others you've seen, and is extremely well-done - Ellie Kendrick is, in particular, an eerie doppelganger of the girl we've come to know through her diary. But the film battles the perennial challenge of films about the Holocaust in general, and Anne Frank, specifically: it's hard to watch, because no matter how the script's words change, the ending is always, painfully, the same.
"The Diary of Anne Frank - Movie Edition" and "The Diary of Anne Frank - BBC Mini Series Edition" are now both available on DVD from Well Go USA Inc.
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hi. i read and reread anne frank's diary. it always touched me. recently, i read about rutka laskier. she was a polish girl growing up in wwII. her diary was published by yashem.org. i am really looking forward to reading that. i think i was around 12 the first time i read anne frank's diary. it's been so long, i can't remember what it had in common with my experience. viva anne frank!
I first read The Diary of Anne Frank as a child, and it changed my life forever. I felt as if I had known her, and still feel this way.
As I grew older, and the horrors of the Holocaust became known, I became Jewish in my heart, and now after many, many years, I find myself converting to Judaism, hopefully to be finalized very soon.
if given a choice , im sure anne would have preferred to live in life than to live in death. While it is necessary to keep her memory alive so that we do not repeat these attrocities, do not make her death to be self sacroficial and a desirable ending. It will always be murder. And those that brought on her death committed murder. Even the sacrifice of one for the many is wrong.
hi, linda mcartney. i'm going to become jewish, too. i identify with chassids. good luck to both of us.
krysilis830@yahoo.com
This is what Iain Glen who plays Otto Frank in the movie has to say,
Iain on Otto
"Otto was idolised and adored by Anne and the challenge was to create a three
dimensional person who went through many emotions and suffered fears and doubts
that he rarely showed and wasn't perceived by his youngest daughter."
I do think Otto was incredibly courageous, devising a deception to keep his
family together against vile oppression. Otto throughout the trials of their
incarceration remained hopeful and did everything to create a normality of
upbringing for his adored daughters."
I enjoyed the production, but it was also very sad. Still it must be read and seen.
Mani
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