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Directed by Jon Blair
A documentary narrated by Kenneth Branagh,
Diary excerpts read by Glenn Close
UK, 1995
Rated PG (Holocaust images, mature themes)
MEMORIES
Schindler’s List thrust the audience into the violent hell of the Holocaust; the film was an unrelenting depiction of the absolute inhumanity that Nazism brought upon Jews and the world. Anne Frank Remembered steps outside the time period. The film puts us in present day, not actually in the concentration camps (though we do visit the grounds). We are outsiders looking in with this film, while with Schindler’s List, we watched as if we were actually at the places the film depicted, surrounded by blood and hate. Yet, Jon Blair’s documentary is often unbearably sad and disturbing. While Steven Spielberg’s 1993 masterpiece forced us to be witnesses to some of the most awful crimes ever committed towards humanity, this documentary that attempts to take a deeper look at Anne Frank, the Jewish heroine, relies on the memories of survivors of the Holocaust, and because of that, Anne Frank Remembered is not as shocking or masterful as Schindler’s List, but it is equally painful.
The film does not make the mistake of making its heroine an untouchable saint. Anne Frank was like any other girl and here, she is made immediately real: her inability to communicate with her mother and her teenage discoveries and fascination with sexuality and her developing body are all very true of adolescence. Anyone who has read her heartbreaking diary, which has sold more than 25 million copies since its publication, knows this was a girl with wonderful frailties. A lot of times, she is made out to be this glorious symbol of perfection- such quotes as "In spite of everything, I still believe people are really good at heart" are powerful from a girl in the face of danger and tyranny, but often, that is the only side we see of Anne.
Jon Blair’s tribute to the girl puts narration by Kenneth Branagh and diary excerpts read by Glenn Close to good use. Close reads sections of Frank’s diary, and as we roam through the actual living quarters of the Franks, her family, and their roommates, the desperate circumstances of those families in that apocalyptic period come to life. Anne’s words sum up the indomitable, though frail, courage to believe that life is still worthwhile, that there is still goodness, even when you have witnessed unspeakable horror. The most moving image in the film is that of the only surviving footage of Anne. For so long, we have connected her with her powerful words. Now, we are able to put face and movement with the mind of the most famous teenager to die at the hands of Hitler’s final solution.
However, though the film attempts to be mainly about Anne and taking a look at her life after the two years chronicled in her legendary pages, the film seems to belong to the elderly interviewees who generously tell of their experiences in the concentration camps and their final meetings with Anne. Anne Frank Remembered is unlike the majority of Holocaust films because of its reminiscent point-of-view. We are not focusing on the pain as if it were the here and now, but we meet actual people (including Miep Gies, the courageous woman who put her life on the line to save the Franks) and feel the repercussions of Nazism’s tremors through their spoken memories. It is deeply distressing to watch them remember, to see aged eyes darkening with gloom.
The Holocaust must never be forgotten. It has become something of a cliché by now, but it is ever so important in an age when we dare to challenge the thought of that era’s existence, and when prejudice and thoughts of complete race annihilation still fill the air of a confused world. We can’t afford to forget, or fail to teach future generations of the sorrow and mass death that ensued from the twisted dictatorship of Adolf Hitler. After hearing so much about the Holocaust, one might forget the impact it had on an entire civilization. Schindler’s List is the film that brings forth ugly images from that time period probably with the most accuracy, and it won’t allow us to dispel the Holocaust as merely history. Neither will Anne Frank Remembered, which captures the faces and the words streaked with sadness. What the documentary eventually leaves clinging to the mind is the unanswerable question: How can survivors possibly go on living life with such horrific memories?
By Andrew Chan
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