ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED
A film review by James Berardinelli
Copyright 1996 James Berardinelli
RATING (0 TO 10): 8.5 Alternative Scale: ***1/2 out of ****
United Kingdom, 1995 U.S. Release Date: varies Running Length: 2:02 MPAA Classification: PG (Mature themes) Theatrical Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
Narrated by Kenneth Branagh; Diary Excerpts read by Glenn Close Director: Jon Blair Producer: Jon Blair Written by: Jon Blair Cinematography: Barry Ackroyd U.S. Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics
Since its initial publication in 1947, THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK has sold more than 25 million copies. It has been adapted for the stage, and, in 1959, made into a feature film. As this new essay about Anne observes, she has become "Hitler's most famous victim" and "a symbol of 10 million murdered", more than ten percent of whom were children. Director Jon Blair (who made the award-winning documentary, SCHINDLER) earned a best documentary Oscar for this, the only comprehensive motion picture chronicling Anne Frank's life.
Those who have read the diary are aware of Anne's indomitable spirit, but, in terms of an historical perspective, her writings cover only two years. Blair's film fills in factual gaps, providing previously-unrevealed tidbits about the Frank family. More importantly, however, the movie extends the tale beyond August 1944, when the last journal entry was made. During the second half of this film, we follow the ultimately-fatal journey that took Anne from her family's hiding place in Amsterdam to Gestapo headquarters to Auschwitz and, finally, Bergen-Belsen, where she died in February 1945 of typhus (one month before the camp was liberated by advancing allied troops). Of the seven who went into hiding with Anne, only one survived the war -- her father, Otto Frank, who devoted the rest of his life to keeping his young daughter's memory alive.
ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED interviews a number of people who knew Anne, either before or after she was sent to the concentration camps. Miep Gies, one of the quartet who concealed the Frank family from the Nazis in Amsterdam for over a year, offers extensive recollections of Anne, her father, and the war. Anne's lone surviving relative, Bernd Elias, expresses his feelings about his cousin. Excerpts from 1976 and 1979 interviews with Otto Frank (who died in 1980) are included. Together with many other testimonials, these form a compelling picture of events not covered by Anne's diary.
In making ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED, Blair obtained the cooperation of the Anne Frank House and Museum in Amsterdam, and was granted permission not only to film in the actual place where the Frank family was hidden, but to re-create the furnishings. With the camera panning through the rooms and Glenn Close reading excerpts from the diary, Anne's presence is almost palpable.
As is always true of movies involving the Holocaust, the most difficult part to watch takes place in the concentration camps. Using eyewitness accounts, ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED pieces together horrifying images of Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen at the time when Anne moved from one to the other. Despite all that has been written and filmed about Hitler's final solution, each new image or word serves only to add new dimensions to our perspective of this monstrous crime against humanity.
Perhaps the most remarkable piece of archival footage presented in this film is a small, one-second film clip of Anne on a balcony -- the only known moving picture ever taken of her. It represents a tenuous link to a girl who is known to so many people through her diary. Even Otto Frank admitted that he never really knew his daughter until he read what she had written.
ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED is as important for what it will preserve for posterity as for the story it tells today. The message emerging from the Holocaust has always been "Never Forget", and films of this quality make it impossible not to remember. If the story of each of Hitler's victims was told with the sensitivity and power of ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED, there would not be enough buckets in the world to hold all the tears.
- James Berardinelli e-mail: berardin@bc.cybernex.net web: http://www.cybernex.net/~berardin
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