Anne Frank - The Whole Story | Ben Kingsley, Brenda Blethyn

Anne Frank - The Whole Story | Ben Kingsley, Brenda Blethyn | Powerful, multi dimensional portrait

DVDs:

Anne Frank - The W...

	Anne Frank - The Whole Story Ben Kingsley, Brenda Blethyn Walt Disney Video, 2001 average customer review:based on 134 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

The story of Anne Frank, a young Jewish girl who lived in hiding with her family during the Nazi occupation.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: UN
Release Date: 5-APR-2005
Media Type: DVD

Excellence

This is an excellent presentation of the story of beloved Anne Frank, the story, the acting, the presentation, all are excellently and marvelously presented. Ben Kingsley shines in the role of the Father of Anne Frank, and the young actress playing Anne is simply a delight. Albeit, this is not a movie meant to entertain, it deeply probes and represents the truth and the original context of the Story of Anne Frank and the circumstances around her life. This movie will leave one shaken, moved, and touched, and the ending will burn a hole into a persons Soul. I recommend this film to anyone who wants to understand WWII, Anne Frank, and the German National Socialists.

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Powerful, multi dimensional portrait

The combination of outstanding acting and material from many sources provides a moving, sometimes horrifying, often warm picture of not only Anne Frank but the love and dedication which sustained many during the horrors of the Holocaust. Normally, the very thought of the time and place is enough to make one shudder, and to envision a world of pure evil and hatred. Though there is no gloss on that aspect, and the concentration camp scenes do not minimise the horror, the mutual caring of those in the Annexe and those who assist them (despite huge danger) provides a balance which can restore a picture of the essential goodness of human nature which even the worst conditions do not always destroy.

Though I have not read the particular biography on which this adaptation is based, I had previously seen interviews with those who knew Anne and her family, and memories of theirs are cleverly interwoven into the early sequences. Anne's portrait is frank and largely amusing, and the subtle recognition of how anti-Jewish measures in Amsterdam slowly stripped Jews of rights is well depicted. The gradual restrictions, at first bothersome but not horrid, are a keen reminder both of how respected neighbours can be reduced to outcasts, and, tellingly, of how those such as Otto Frank could initially have felt safe in Amsterdam.

Seeing Anne with friends, at school, in her lovely flat, and at Otto's office makes the impact of the hiding and constant fright understandable - I felt claustrophobic and trapped just watching the relatively peaceful days in the Annexe. Anne's reflections, based on her diary, will strike a chord with anyone. The hatred surrounding her from the invaders is clear, but the other struggles are those all of us face as we come to maturity, and the limited picture one normally could have from having 'seen' only the time in hiding can turn Anne into a monument rather than a cheeky, inspired, boy obsessed, intelligent teenager.

There are times when even brief lines capture a great deal. For example, when Otto Frank, in response to Anne's overall bitterness towards all Germans, reminds her both that the Franks are German and that protector Miep is Austrian (just like Hitler), it is a strong reminder of how coming to maturity means broadening perspective.

The scenes in the concentration camp do not spare the viewer the horror of the reality. Anne's screaming for her father; the tragic sequence when women, stripped of clothes and hair, try to cover themselves to maintain dignity; the utter cruelty of the female who tells Anne the men are already gassed as she tattoos Anne's arm with her identification number, all would cause one to wonder what sort of hatred could lead to so degrading others, even before we see or hear of anyone's dying. Camera angles which capture the chimneys of Auschwitz show us, all too well, the awareness of death with which the prisoners lived at each moment.

I believe that this film is enriching and enlightening, however painful the camp sequences are (and well they should be). My only caution for classroom use is that students need to have previous awareness of the history of the era, and have already braced themselves for scenes of the horror of the camps. Those who have only small familiarity with Anne's diary, which naturally chronicles no nightmarish events, could be very shocked otherwise.

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Anne

Fabulous, loved the fact that it is her life before, during and after the diary.

Good Movie

This movie gives a good insight on what Anne Frank went through during this horrible time. I only wished to see more of the wide spread result of Hitler's insanity.

Good TV movie

Ben Kingsley is one of the great actors of our time. His performance here as Otto Frank conveys quiet strength in the face of unfathomable sorrow. But the episodic nature (where the commercial breaks are too obvious) and the tour de force allotted to young Hannah Taylor-Gordon verges on becoming a pity-party. This is, after all, a Disney film.

Would I use it in the classroom? Probably not, because of (brief) bare breasts in the concentration camp, and because the teleplay by Kirk Ellis ["The Three Stooges" (2000)] plods toward the inevitable without capturing the irrepressible spirit that the unfinished diary leads us to believe ought to be there. One ought to feel uplifted by Anne's presence; instead, one feels, "What a waste; bad Nazis!" True enough, but that's only part of the story.

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