We meet two ladies who are living freely in their late teens and sporting a yellow patch of cloth on their arm as Nazi Germany asserts its complete control over Amsterdam in 1940. In the tragic novel My Best Friend Anne Frank, two Jewish best friends, Hannah Goslar and Anne Frank, learn that one of them is miraculously fortunate to live free despite the fact that their fates have already been decided.
The movie opens with two girls playingfully exploring Anne’s upper attic while her father continues to countdown and dictates a formal paper to his stenographer while also participating in Anne’s game of hide and seek. Hannah at least takes it seriously enough to suddenly rush into the attic above with Anne. But when they witness a Nazi officer kicking a Jew in the face, reality sinks in.
The book My Best Friend Anne Frank beautifully captures what life was like in Amsterdam at the period. It was never safe to go outdoors since horror was always waiting to attack at their door. They endured constant worry that they would be taken to the concentration camps. Because it would make it much more painful to realise that people could even live like this, you could never see this movie becoming a series. The goal of director Ben Sombogaart is to depict how both girls’ lives altered after experiencing what they could never have imagined as they were such strong-willed individuals.
Cinematically, My very best pal With occasional painful reminders of how the Jews were handled as they showed up for attendance each morning while being cruelly cursed at, Anne Frank tenderly touches you all over. Sometimes, while standing in front of one another, they would steal an apple from the medical store and hide it to pass it on. As the Nazi soldiers fled for shelter, they were forced to stand in the middle of a military airstrike while holding up their hands. In reality, a boy kissing Anne is just slobbering on her neck, and she expects Hannah to come to her aid. When Hannah asks Anne to marry her with a ring her father gave her in secret, Anne dances a jazz routine around the house while wearing a mop on her head. When the Nazi officers break into Hannah’s home and force her labouring mother onto the bed, squeezing and yelling as they do so.
Hannah Goslar collaborated with author Alison Leslie Goldand to write a book titled Memories of Anne Frank: Reflections of a Childhood Friend because we would never get to know Anne Frank personally. Through the lens of the director, we see that Hannah is Anne’s best friend and that she is an independent young woman with no restrictions. Even though the book is written from Hannah’s point of view, we see Anne from the outside till the very end. Because the Diary of Anne Frank is the only other piece of material we have, we can understand Hannah’s path. The movie allows us to see into Anne’s life, which took a perilous turn once she was uprooted from her family’s safe haven, the Secret Annex, one step ahead of this diary.
Major Spoilers Following
As we transition from Hannah’s present time in the concentration camp alone with a group of Hungarian women to her memories of a free and happy life with her father, pregnant mother, and baby sister, Gabi, that she had in the past, screenwriters Marian Batavier and Paul Ruven put Hannah’s story in the foreground with Anne as part of it.
As Otto Frank, Anne’s father, begs Vader Goslar, Hannah’s father, to try to flee with him to the Annex, My Best Friend Anne Frank moves swiftly to explain the underlying peril that lies for him. to make every effort to remain undetected for as long as possible.
Meanwhile, Hannah’s father is certain that they will obtain German passports and depart the country. However, Anne Frank vanished on December 1st, 1940, leaving Hannah without a letter. She falls into a deep despair as a result. When the pregnant mother, Mutti, passes away, the arresting cops return and knock on their doors, sealing their destiny. Hannah is at the concentration camps with her sister Gabi, and their father is in the hospital. He managed to get the three of them safe passage (human exchange for a German) despite his excruciating coughing. Hannah hears someone whistling the song that only Anne knew during morning attendance. With renewed optimism, Hannah makes an effort to locate Anne on the other side of the hay-constructed wall that divides the two camps. Hannah only gets a chance to talk to Anne by pure luck. She is with her older sister Margot, and the two of them haven’t eaten in days. When Hannah’s father passes away, tragedy strikes once more, and the ladies in the camp present the kids with the breadcrumbs they had hoarded for themselves as a memorial gift for a loved one who has passed away. Hannah gathers everything, places it in a box, wraps it, and throws it over the wall to Anne. Hannah tears aside the hay from the wall to get a glance at her friend after Anne catches the box and opens it to eat. Anne has her body covered in a brown, heavy cloth, and her head has been shaved. This is their final meeting before they restore their friendship.
The day after Hannah leaves, Anne departs from this world after spending two years in the Annex and two years in the Camps in hiding. Otto Frank, Anne’s father, was able to escape the concentration camps and later discovered her writings. He collected them into a diary to keep a record of who she was and what she stood for. The movie is extremely demanding to see, yet the stink of the Nazis remaining in the background gives the audience heart and mind hope, making it ideal to watch at least once.
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Ben Sombogaart is the director of the 2021 drama film My Best Friend Anne Frank. Netflix is presently streaming it.
