The Diary of Anne Frank

Sixty-three years after the death of Anne Frank, this drama presents the story of her years in hiding in five half-hour episodes, which focus in depth on the events within the annex above her father's factory.

Newcomer Ellie Kendrick plays Anne as a fiery teenager, struggling with inner conflicts and her emerging sexual feelings. This couldn't be presented as clearly in earlier adaptations, and I think this is the first version to use pages of the diary as source material which were originally suppressed by Anne's father, the only person of the eight in the annex to survive the war.

Iain Glen and Tamsin Grieg are both superb as Anne's parents, while Margot (Felicity Jones) and Peter Van Daan (Geoff Breton) present their characters' limited facets very well. Ron Cook, Lesley Sharp, and Nicolas Farrell play the remaining refugees (Mr and Mrs Van Daan, and dentist Mr Dussell).

You get a real sense of what it is to live in a confined space, largely in silence, with only a few hours of respite to go downstairs for food (Peter has to take potatoes from the warehouse below), and to talk and live together in some semblance of real life. For three years this was the life for eight individuals and a cat living in close proximity, sometimes with hope, sometimes with fear.

Rightly, this series ends with details of what happened to each of the refugees, and does not flinch from making clear the plight of the Jews outside of the annex, who are taken away in the night and herded into transports towards their death - such a fate also awaits the occupants of the Dutch annex, and it is with a heavy heart we realise this at the end - even though we knew it all the time, we lived in hope along with them.

One can only be grateful to the BBC, which (along with a lot of rubbish) produces so many worthwhile, thoughtful and carefully crafted programmes.

This is one of them. The story of Anne, her family, Peter's family and the dentist has been dramatised with great attention to detail and sensitivity. The sets seem to be exact recreations of the real hiding place in Amsterdam.

Ellie Kendrick is a great find as Anne. She is quite a good look-alike and convincingly acts Anne's personality. This version is far from painting her as a saint. She is portrayed as quite selfish and petulant, and cruel towards her mother. This seems to be truthful.

Most of the rest of the cast are good, and are also have quite a good resemblance to the real people they represent.

I only have doubts about the actor playing Peter. He is way too old for the part. A man of 24 is not suitable to play a boy of 16, try as he might. To make matters worse, his face seems to have been painted pink and white to make him seem younger, but this merely looks unnatural.

However, this is a minor blemish in a very good production.

The cramped existence that the Jewish hideouts were forced to endure during WWII and the Nazi period, is excellently portrayed by a cast of sensitive actors who were fortunate to have a good script to work with.

Ellie Kendrick makes an excellent Anne, bearing a good resemblance to the Jewish girl who loved writing and kept a daily diary of events in the attic where her parents and a some other neighbors were forced to stay. Leslie Sharp and Nicholas Farrell as the Van Daans are particularly moving members of the strong cast.

The gradual maturity of a girl confronting her feelings about boys as she grows up is portrayed in a poignant and tender manner. The story is compelling from the start and increases in intensity as various conflicts among the attic inhabitants arouse hostility and anger.

What might have made the whole drama even more intense would be outdoor scenes outside the confines of the attic showing how the villagers were being treated by the Nazis, but since those incidents would be outside the scope of Anne's diary the drama remains intimate instead with a narrower focus.

Well worth viewing even if you've seen the big screen version made by George Stevens in 1959.

''The Diary of Anne'' (2009) is an accurate adaption of Anne Frank's diary. It's a very nice movie. I am very much interested about Anne Frank and I've seen six movies about Anne Frank. The 2009 adaption of Anne's diary is a fine one. Although it is not as excellent as ''Anne Frank: The Whole Story'' (2001), it is a very moving miniseries and can give the audience a clear idea about Anne Frank. The casting was excellent. Ellie Kendrick- I have no words to describe her- gave an amazing performance as Anne Frank. Really, Ellie is a talented young actress. I'd also like to praise the performances of Felicity Jones who played Margot Frank, Geoff Breton who played Peter van Daan and Tamsin Greig who played Edith Hollander Frank. And Nicholas Ferrell, who played Albert Dussel, also gave a wonderful performance. Lesley Sharp who played Petronella van Daan and Kate Ashfield who played Miep Gies also gave wonderful performances. The casting was, in short, excellent. The story was also arranged in such a way that we liked the movie very much. But I'd like to say that ''Anne Frank: The Whole Story'' and ''The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank'' were better than ''The Diary of Anne Frank'' (2009), but still, the 2009 adaption was indeed a nice one and I liked it. I'd like to give the movie: 7 out of 10.

I love a good TV drama, and The Diary of Anne Frank is that. Along with Occupation, it was one of the highlights of 2009, having been profoundly moved and disturbed by the events detailed in Anne Frank's diary since I was a little girl in primary school, this was a harrowing, poignant, sensitive and wonderfully acted mini-series that stayed true to the book. The mini-series is exquisite to look at, stunning costumes and settings, and the house was exactly like the house in real life. The writing is unusually sensitive, I never felt the mini-series got overly-dramatic or overly-sentimental, quite the opposite, and I think the writing really helped with that. The direction is excellent, and the music is haunting and evocative. It was the acting though where the Diary of Anne Frank really soared. Ellie Kendrick, instead of the obnoxious teenager she could have been, made for an intelligent yet somewhat lively Anne, very like the Anne in the book. Iain Glen is charming as the perfect father figure and Tamsin Grieg is luminous and quiet as the mother. Lesley Sharp is exceptional as Petronella, a selfish and independent matriarch, her actions were very entertaining. Then there is the sudden discovery, even for those who had read the book it was emotional, intense and sudden. Overall, this is a brilliant mini-series, in my opinion it is a must see! 10/10 Bethany Cox