SueAnn Porter

I just finished watching this great movie from 2001, “Anne Frank – The Whole Story,” Starring Ben Kingsley as Anne’s Father, Otto Frank. This movie tells what happened before and after the diary.

Just about every human on the planet is familiar with “The Diary of a Young Girl,” as it has sold over 30 million copies and been translated into many languages. Most of us met Anne in high school English class.

This version of the film starts with Anne living her every day life. She goes to school, picks out her clothes, giggles with friends. Slowly, in the background we see the Nazis coming. One step at a time. First the Jews had to register for a census. Then they had to wear yellow stars. Then they were not allowed to own business. One step at a time…the Jews were pushed into the trains to go to the concentration camps.

We humans like to think that the Holocaust could never happen again. Because we see it with our 20/20 hindsight vision.

Like the proverb of the frog: If you throw the frog into the boiling water, he will jump out. But if you put him into the pot with warm water and slowly turn up the temperature, he will cook to death in his complacency. And make a fine stew.

Miep Gies was the woman who helped to hide Anne and her family and brought the family food and supplies while they were in hiding–and she was one of the Consultants on this movie. (She lived to be 100 years old and died in 2010.)

* SPOILER ALERT * If you plan to watch the movie, move down to the end of this post and hit the “like” button, but don’t read on. 😉

Anne Frank’s father Otto, survived the camps and made it back home after the war. When he got back, Miep Gies gave him Anne’s diary and writings, which Miep had faithfully saved in a drawer while the family was gone. Anne and her sister Margot died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp just two weeks before the British troops liberated the camp.  Anne’s mother died of starvation in the Birkenau infirmary. And Peter, Anne’s teenage crush, survived the march from Auschwitz, only to die in the Mauthausen Concentration Camp three days before the Americans liberated it.

At the end of the movie, facts are displayed on the various characters. “One and a half million children were killed. Anne’s story is only one of them.”

Related articles

• “Of course. That goes without saying.” – Miep Gies (hollandbelgium2013.wordpress.com)
• Book Review – “The Diary Of A Young Girl: The Definitive Edition” by Anne Frank (thewanderingbookworm.wordpress.com)
• Reporting from Amsterdam: The Anne Frank Museum (powerlineblog.com)