‘Anne Frank Remembered’ Is A Real Study Of Sensitive Teenager

In the emotional stuffiness of the 1950s, Anne Frank was portrayed as a virtual saint.

Check out, for example, the central storyline of George Stevens’ 1959 movie “The Diary of Anne Frank.” An emotion-draining drama, based on the successful 1955 Broadway play that ran for 717 performances, Stevens’ film only hinted at life as most of us tend to experience it.

Director Stevens even cast 20-year-old Millie Perkins to play the German-born Anne who was not yet 17 when she died in the Bergen-Belsen death camp in March 1945.

In her diary as originally published, Anne exhibited all the childish spirit and naivete that we hope to see in our children. Only a wondrous spirit, especially after being confined for more than two years in a small attic space above her father’s Amsterdam business, could write such a line as, “In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart.”

But Anne revealed much more, as well. And it is a fuller view of this young girl, symbolized for her misfortune of being cut down before she could even begin to experience the joys of adult life, that documentary filmmaker Jon Blair puts forth in his Oscar-winning documentary “Anne Frank Remembered.”

Blair isn’t interested in portraying young Anne as a symbol, not of innocence corrupted nor anything else. His view of Anne is realistic, showing us a girl who is at once intelligent, head-strong, demanding, romantic, sexually curious and so frustrating to deal with at times that her parents - especially her mother - must have been tempted to toss her out the window.

But instead of lessening the tragedy of what finally occurred not only to Anne, her sister and mother as well, Blair’s insistence on emphasizing the real Anne only adds to his film’s emotional impact.

Instead of stopping where most accounts of Anne’s diary do, with her family’s betrayal and arrest, “Anne Frank Remembered” continues. It follows the Franks after their arrest in August 1944, through their separation, mother Frank’s death in early 1945 and the sisters’ deaths of typhus just a few days apart and barely two months before Germany’s surrender on May 8.

And it proceeds past even that, following Anne’s father, Otto Frank, as he survives his stay at Auschwitz to go on and publish Anne’s diary in 1947 (he died at age 91 in 1980).

Along the way, Blair complements the Franks’ story by interviewing several of their friends, a few death-camp acquaintances and especially the Frank employees who, at genuine risk, provided the family with regular supplies. Through the memories of such survivors as Miep Gies, who saved Anne’s diary from the Gestapo, Blair’s film gives Anne’s diary the real-life footing that both the stage play and movie versions lack.

And at the film’s heart remains the diary’s author herself. Blair offers us an unexpurgated look at an uninhibited young woman who, until the very end, remained unintimidated by a life that ultimately betrayed her.

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Anne Frank Remembered ****

Taking an already powerful subject, documentary filmmaker Jon Blair adds to the lore of Anne Frank by using interviews with those who were there. Blair even shoots on the actual site in Amsterdam where the Franks and another Jewish family hid for more than two years from German authorities. Against this backdrop, he employs narration by Kenneth Branagh and a reading of Anne’s diary entries by Glenn Close. The result is a comprehensive study of the real-life girl who, caught in the complex light of reality, becomes much more than just a symbol of murdered innocence. Not rated

Last Dance **1/2

While it would be easy to lampoon Sharon Stone’s grab for thespian legitimacy - at one point her character, a convicted murderer, says, “I’m so bad” - the fact is that Stone’s acting isn’t all that bad here. At least she’s not an embarrassment (she sure can cry well). Rob Morrow (“Northern Exposure”) plays the rich-boy-trying-to-do-good who takes up her cause, and there is a genuine sense of chemistry between them. The problems with this Bruce Beresford film involve the easy targets (e.g., a politically hungry governor), Stone’s generic cracker-like accent and a plotline that ultimately is pure Hollywood. While it is a virtual rehash of “Dead Man Walking,” “Last Dance” has only a hint of that film’s riveting authenticity. Rated R

Stealing Beauty **1/2

Barnardo Bertolucci, a true master of 20th-century cinema, seems to be slumming here as he indulges in a story so slight as to be nearly invisible. Liv Tyler portrays a young woman both looking to end her girlhood and, at the same time, unravel the secret of her conception. The experience involves her being passed from one British expatriate to the other, all of whom seem so worldweary that they leech onto this youthful presence with all the energy of starving vampires. One of the film’s many problems is its central actress, Tyler, who just doesn’t have the acting chops to justify such attention. The other main obstacle is Bertolucci himself, who is too old to be aping “hip” visuals and a too intelligent to be exploring a theme that is little more than the tired fantasies of an aging male. Rated R

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