User Reviews

This is a pretty good adaptation. The casting is great, the acting is brilliant, and the story is very closely based on the diary. It's very sad, emotional, and realistic. But for me there's two main downsides. The first is that I wish they'd shown more about her life before going into hiding. She wrote quite a lot about it in her diary (for example, the hilarious part where she gets in trouble at school). It would have been more interesting. The second is that I find this Anne Frank too unpleasant. I get it, the real Anne was annoying and selfish, but she also had a nice side - she was optimistic, bright and cheerful - and I didn't see enough of that in this series. A little bit, but not enough. They made her even more spiteful than she really was. For example, in her diary she often talks badly of her mother, but she also mentions that she'd wouldn't tell those things to her: "I soothe my conscience with the thought that it's better for unkind words to be down on paper than for Mother to have to carry them around in her heart."

So despite being very outspoken, and often arguing with her mother, she at least had the heart to keep those nastiest thoughts secret. In this series she actually does say them to her mother, which makes her significantly nastier. They also made the mother too pitiful, always very quiet and sad. She's constantly portrayed as the victim whereas in Anne's diary her dislike for her mother is more understandable, because of her occasional insensitive behaviour towards her which is not shown in this series.

Another example is the bit where her mother comes to her with a prayer book. In her diary Anne says she didn't feel like reading the prayers, but she did it to please her. In the series, she just looks surprised: "A prayer book?" And then she goes on saying she isn't interested in religion, and then asks "Why should we worship God? What's He ever done for us?" The real Anne would never have said that. In the book she frequently mentions God, and it's always in a positive way. She also mentions that she prayed every evening with her dad. And things like this: "The best remedy for those who are frightened, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere they can be alone, alone with the sky, nature and God. For then and only then can you feel that everything is as it should be and that God wants people to be happy amid nature's beauty and simplicity."

So while it's true she wasn't very interested in religion, there was absolutely no need to remove her spirituality. I'm sure that if Anne would have watched this, she would have been disappointed.

This new TV adaption of the story of Anne Frank produced by BBC is what I had been looking forward to for a long time. However, after watching all of the five episodes this week, I felt a bit disappointed.

As a big fan of Anne Frank all the time, certainly I have read her affecting diary that nearly everybody in the world knows about, as well as the memoir written by the attic-helper Miep Gies and the biography written by Melissa Muller. Besides this new BBC version, I also had watched three videos of her story before: one is a film and the other two are made for TV. The film adaption was made in 1959 by Americans, which is the first work about Anne on screen. Though I don't like this film at all since the cast and the set are far away from the truth in history, it still hold the value and importance for its first attempt of adapting her story. The second is a TV adaption made in 1988 by US, and compared to the film adaption, this one stepped forward quite much in any aspect. For the reason that it was mainly based on the memoir "Anne Frank Remembered" written by Miep Gies, this little-known TV adaption only adopted the view of Miep Gies and thus overlooked most of the details in the attic as well as the content of Anne's diary. The third one "Anne Frank: The Whole Story" is still a TV adaption made by Americans in 2001, despite the fact that most of the characters are from Britain. This is the only adaption I am totally satisfied with and I can't help to watch it over and over again. It is based on the biography of Anne Frank written by Melissa Muller and covers the whole life of our little Heroin including her joyful life before hiding, the hard days in the secrete attic and the tragic last period in the concentration camp. I have to say the cast and set of this adaption are so appropriate and exact that it is just as authentic as the history. The plot is intense, compelling and heart-warming, thereby making you feel like that you were trapped in the attic too and could be caught at any time.

This new BBC adaption, however, is more like an English soap than a serious historical drama. Anyway, the little star Ellie Kendrick looks very witty and enchanting, but some of rest characters are quite boring especially her mother who looks just like suffering from the mental disease. Moreover, Mrs. Petronella Van Daan, her lips are always as red as cherry, and her untimely humor is extremely annoying and unnecessary. Even the Sergeant in the last episode looks so kind and so English that we can't think him as a Nazi devil. On the whole, this diary based adaption gets some improper humor and the act of some roles are a bit exaggerated in my opinion. It seems like they were threatening themselves deliberately rather than revealing the fear in their own heart naturally.

I have seen many versions of Anne Frank's story and I was really impressed by the quality of this version. The first good point is how is portraited Edith, it's the first time we can see how panicked she was when arrived in the annex. The second good point is the reaction of Otto by a personal letter written to him by Anne, something that had never been shown before.

Thumbs up to Ellie Kendrick, the best Anne Frank so far and Lesley Sharp as Petronella. Lesley Sharp delivered the best Mrs. van Daan just as described in Anne Frank's Diary.

I'm looking forward to the DVD!

This is a short mini series only 5 30 minutes episodes. This was one of the best portrayals I have ever seen. The actress who played her was amazing and looked so much like her. I made me almost cry,made me laugh and made me angry. The last episode was very nervewrecking,you knew what was going to happen yet you wanted it to turn out differently. Despite it being during the war she was still your average teenager and you can still relate to her. I still like Anne Frank The Whole Story best but this was a wonderful version too.This portrayal of Anne can be egotistical and short-tempered. There are a few scenes where Anne talks about her changing body and her sexuality and one scene where she touches her breasts in a sexual way. The devotion of the "helpers" warms my heart at seeing people who put their lives on the line to help hide the people in the annex. When the nazi's finally do come is such a heartbreaking scene especially when you know how close the war was to ending.

My Mother always told me the story of Anne Frank when I was a child, she told me about a young German Jewish girl who hid from the Nazi's in Amsterdam with her family and kept a diary during World War 2. For some reason she never told me( or I just didn't remember ) what happened to her in the end. Not ashamed to say the end of this series very nearly destroyed me, probably the saddest scene in any film I have ever watched.

Ellie Kendrick is the best Anne I have seen. Unlike Anne Frank: The whole story this series contains direct quotes from Anne's diary. It only follows Anne's time in hiding, unlike Anne Frank: The whole story which deals with Anne's life before hiding, during hiding and after capture.

This is an important series that should be seen by all. It changed my life.

It's 1942 Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. Otto Frank (Iain Glen) brings his wife Edith (Tamsin Greig), his daughters Margot (Felicity Jones), and Anne (Ellie Kendrick) to hide in a secret annex above his food and spice warehouse. They must keep quiet during the work day. Only the office staff Miep Gies (Kate Ashfield), Bep Voskuijl (Mariah Gale), Mr Kugler (Tim Dantay), and Mr Kleiman (Roger Frost) know the secret. The Franks are joined by Hermann Van Daan (Ron Cook), his brash wife Petronella (Lesley Sharp), and their son Peter (Geoff Breton). The final addition is dentist Albert Dussel (Nicholas Farrell) who becomes Anne's roommate. In the confined space, the personal conflicts mount. The Allies are closing in and freedom is almost at hand.

This is like the Titanic. The sinking is inevitable but the story is still so compelling. Anne's modern humanity is undeniable. The performances are pitch perfect. Each character is well-defined and engaging. Ellie Kendrick is terrific in the lead. The mini-series ends with their capture. It makes no speculation about their informer. Their tragic ends are spelled out in text. I guess their horrific endings are subject for another time.

It must be hard to remake such a well known story, but this adaptation was quite brilliant. True to the book it captured each character brilliantly; Anne played by Ellie Kendrick is the best screen version yet ; Iain Glen is brilliant as the Father, Otto Frank and his wife Edith played perfectly by Tamsin Greig, Margot (Felicity Jones), Hermann Van Daan (Ron Cook), his wife Petronella (Lesley Sharp), and their son Peter (Geoff Breton) and the dentist Albert Dussel (Nicholas Farrell). Every actor played their part brilliantly. The series also captures the claustrophobic atmosphere and shows the difficulties of their situation really well. Although we all know the end, it was still upsetting as we now know the characters so well. This series captures the humanity of those hiding and the evil of those who found them. How they were found remains unknown, but there are indications that someone told where they were. It is heartbreaking that they were caught so close to the end of the war. Every racist person should be forced to watch this, because sadly the attitudes of those who pursued the Nazi ideology of ethnic cleansing still exists today. How any human can do what they did to this family including very young children such as Ann is beyond most decent persons comprehension. Maybe this series should be shown in every School?

This movie was very captivating. It gave a good sense of what the times were like during the Holocaust, and what Jews had to go through to survive. It made you feel empathy the characters. The actors were very good at embracing their character and giving you a better sense of the characters personalities. In the book Anne didn't go into depth about her family's looks because she wasn't actually planning on anyone reading her journal. The movie gave a better perspective of her family without as much dialogue. I'm glad that I read the book before I watched the movie. The movie left out some of the smaller details the book was able to explain in more depth. I had to keep reminding myself that Anne's diary was first hand, and replace some of the missing details from knowledge from the book. The most intense scene was where there was a bombing going on outside of the Annex. You could feel the fear Anne's family was feeling. They felt trapped because there was nowhere "safer" for them to go, they just had to wait for the bombing to end and hope the Annex didn't get bombed.