User reviews

Interesting to see a film based around the life of Anne Frank , but not solely all about her and for a change Anne is not portrayed as a complete angel.

However it's a film worth watching alone for the performance of Josephine Arendsen who was superb as Hannah Goslar.

A beautiful film about the friendship between Anne Frank and her friend Hannah. Do not care what others have voted down about the film, it is touching and sensitive and it will be difficult to keep the tears away.

Emotional and authentic film, definitely worth seeing!

The movie was really good..... for what I could understand. I wish at the very least the subtitles were on and correct. Three were moments when there wasn't voice over or subtitles so guessing by body language you may figure it out. If you want to reach a wider audience I suggest at the very least have subtitles. Kind of frustrating.

Told from the perspective of Anne Frank's closest companion, Hannah Goslar (who is still alive at 93), this fictionalized movie jumps back and forth between their idyllic life in Amsterdam and what inevitably happened to them after the Nazis took them away. Of course, the latter scenes are necessarily harsh and provide the heartbreaking moments you fully expect from the outset. The problem is that Anne comes across as capricious in the pre-camp scenes while Hannah remains stoic and devoted. Director Ben Sombogaart's simplistic approach seems at odds with the touching story despite affecting performances from the two leads, Josephine Arendsen as Hannah and Aiko Beemsterboer, who bears a striking resemblance to the real Anne Frank.

I took it as a nice surprise that they showed a different point of view than most of Anne's films. Here she is more sassy, she acts more playfully, ignoring the fact that something very bad is happening in her town, she wanted to have fun, have jokes, kiss boys (and maybe girls?) was a good point. What was missing was the budget to work better in some scenes. And I feel that the actresses had too little experience to show the full vividness of what it was like to be a teenager in 1942.

As "My Best Friend Anne Frank" (2021 release from the Netherlands; 106 min.) opens, it is "1942 Amsterdam", and we are introduced to Hannah Goslar and Anne Frank, BFFs who are about 12-13 years old. As girls that age tend to do, they muse about boys, dreams, their parents. Except that of course they are Jewish, and Amsterdam is occupied by the Nazis. We then go to "1945 Bergen-Belsen Exchange Camp", and Hannah is there with her little sister Gabi, while Anne is close by, in the neighboring concentration camp. At this point we are 10 min into the film.

Couple of comments: this movie is the latest from Oscar nominated Dutch director Ben Sombogaart {"Twin Sisters"). Here he brings us the story of Hannah Goslar, Anne Frank's closest childhood friend. It should be emphasized that Anne Frank's role in the film is purely secondary, although we do learn some things about Anne along the way (for one, she was really mischievous). The movie goes back and forth between 1942 and 1945, and while we of course known the ultimate outcome (one girl doesn't survive), the 1945 scenes are by far the better. That said, I wondered why Hannah was put into the Exchange Camp (where each day a few were released and exchanged in return for a German POW), but Anne was not. The film never explains it. The best part of the 1942 scenes is to get a sense of what day-to-day life was like in Amsterdam under Nazi occupation. Beware: there are a number of scenes where the atrocities are laid bare and are frankly difficult to watch. The pure hatred and worse from the Nazis is something I'll never understand. In the end, this film is a worthwhile addition to the Anne Frank catalog of films out there.

"My Best Friend Anne Frank" premiered in the Netherlands last Fall, and started streaming on Netflix earlier this week. If you have any interest in the Holocaust, or WWII in general, I'd readily suggest you check this out, and draw your own conclusion.

I liked the performance of josephine Arendsen. I liked the crumbs from Anne Frank diary . And the noble effort to show , in decent - gentle manner, essential things about realities out of words. Because each speech , in a form of other, about Shoah fails.

Not very convinced by the option for Anne Frank ( she reminds me more a young Elizabeth Taylor ), the film has the gift to represent a lovely portrait of friendship, more than story of Hannah Goslar.

Indeed, a sketch . And it can not be more .

Not memorable but touching and correct.

Its sin - it has the chance to be only a sort of letter from a very, too very far time. Not about time , but about the real understanding of that cruel, brutal, cold reality.

It was too clean didn't really leave me feeling how they things were for Jewish families or how they were treated in the camp.

I think the translation to English left some of the feeling out and what was really said.

Summary

Although it is not very novel, the film does provide the view of Anne Frank from one of her best friends, outside of her famous diary, and once again highlights the precariousness of life under the Nazi-fascist regimes, with little time that can mediate between the suffocating daily life that both lived in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam, where they could still play at having projects, and the absolute horror of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp to which they were deported.

Review:

This Dutch film by Ben Sombogaart recounts moments of the friendship between Hannah Goslar and Anne Frank during the Nazi occupation of Amsterdam in 1942 and alternates them with Hannah's captivity in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1944, where Anne was also a prisoner. Frank but in another sector.

Hannah Goslar is a real character. As in the case of Anne Frank, after the rise of Nazism in Germany, her family emigrated to the Netherlands. The two had known each other since 1933 and were schoolmates. The film has the merit of providing Hannah's point of view for the painting of a restless, audacious and sexually awakened Ana at a time prior to the one reflected in most of her famous Diary (where Ana names her as Lies Goslar), and also on the later one in Bergen-Belsen.

The contrast between what is seen in 1942 and the situation in 1944 could not be more devastating, since the story goes back and forth between both years and scenarios. Of course, in 1942 the Nazi occupation and its anti-Jewish racial laws made themselves felt in full force in Amsterdam. Clearly, the film reflects the uncertainty of the families of both friends and their uncertain plans for the future, under a sense of permanent threat and a siege that narrows due to unclear rules always violated by the Nazis and the deportations of Jews that were already taking place. But despite everything, Hannah and Ana manage to maintain a daily life full of games typical of girls their age, where they begin to glimpse life projects...

In Hannah's case, her family consisted of her father, her pregnant mother, and a very young sister. And it is illustrative to complete the panorama, a newsreel of the time that the film includes.

The "transit" sector of the camp where Hannah and part of her family were imprisoned was less severe than others in the same camp, and the film explains why. The film soberly and harshly reflects the horrors of that concentration camp life that nevertheless had some margin of hope and where she tries to communicate with her friend. The performance of the young actresses Josephine Arendsen and Aiko Beemsterboer (as Hannah and Ana, respectively) as well as the rest of the cast, is solvent and successful reconstruction of the period.

It is true that My Best Friend Anne Frank does not provide too much news about Nazism in general and about Anne Frank in particular, but it does highlight once again the precariousness of life under fascist regimes, with the little time that can mediate between the suffocating everyday life of occupied Amsterdam and the absolute horror of the Nazi camps.

An interesting portrayal of Anne Franks best friend Hannah Goslar and their relationship as teenage girls growing up in Nazi occupied Amsterdam.

I thought they portrayed Anne is a slightly annoying brat who at one point emotionally tormented Hannah by ignoring her.

However I thought the idea of showing Hannah's story was a powerful and fresh point of view to what million of Jews horribly endured during World War Two.

Not a classic but still a very sad story.

The movie has Anne Frank in the title, but it stars a different person. A friend of hers, who has her own journey and her own struggles ... and her own problems to survive. That being said, that should not deter you from watching this.

Nor the fact that it switches from good times to a harsh reality - which makes viewing this quite the hard task to say the least. Just when you see the girls/friends happy, you get taken away from that and shown concentration camps or other horrible things that (mainly) Jews had to endure back then.

Watching this - one can only hope that comparisons that are being made right now, are going to stop. I do not want to get too political, but when there is a pandemic, you should not compare yourself to people that were actually hunted and had to die for no reason at all - and not being able or having a choice in the matter.

But the movie was not made to be compared to nowadays. It was made to show how cruel or rather how horrible of a time it was back then ... and in that the movie succeeds.

The two young actresses Aiko Beemsterboer and Josephine Arendsen played an outstanding performance. Both should get the Oscar for best role in a foreign movie. I could really immerse in this brutal situation and I cannot explain how this catastrophe could ever be happening in our human story. God bless Anne and all the other poor victims. Check it out. 7/10.

Hanneli and Anne are best friends in Amsterdam, together with another small bunch of teenage girls. Unfortunately, they are Jews and are vilified on a daily basis by the Nazis. Still, they try to enjoy themselves, thinking about boys and trying to escape reality. If their daily life is not happy in 1942, worse is yet to come.

Apart from the lack of suspense, because everybody knows what happened to Anne and it's clear that Hanneli survived since she's telling the story, the big issue with this narrative is that you never really get to know Hanneli and Anne comes across as a big teaser and a silly teenage, obsessed with boys. Surely, Frank was not a saint and this should not be a hagiography, but the level of silliness and teasing is laid down too thick.

It doesn't help that the timeline shifts back and forward continuously, between the last happy days in Amsterdam and life in Bergen-Belsen and it helps even less watching the movie in the English version. Hanneli parents speak German to her and between then and she answers in English (Dutch in the original) so one may wonder what's going on in that family. There is no explanation about the fact that they were Germans escaping the persecution and Hanneli herself should have been speaking German.

More mess in the concentration camp, where a Hungarian woman's spoken part is not translated or subtitled, so you end up following a "dialogue" with Hanneli speaking English, someone answering in German, and someone else in Hungarian.

Despite the touching story and convincing screenplay, and of course the amazing portrayal of Anne and Hanneli, there was something missing.

Poor direction?

Nevertheless, an angle from the point of view of Hanneli did throw a different perspective to the story.

It tells the story we already know, but from a different perspective. This time, we're going to focus on Anna's best friend, Hana.

In my opinion, the film has a lot of potential that is not fully realized. While I understand the creators' intention to explore the two girls' teenage years, I think it went too far and focused too much on the passion for boys and the talk of sexuality.

Even so, the movie has heartwarming scenes as well as some heartbreaking ones. This movie deserves to be seen. Just don't expect something like "life is beautiful".

Ik couldn't wait this movie to appaer in cinemas. When it finally did, I went to see it in the first weekend. And I couldn't have been more disappointed..! The movie, basically, is the trailer. That is all you need to see. Anne is portraited as a very annoying, mean, spoiled brat. And Hannelie is so obsessed with Anne, it makes you feel uncomfortabele. Most of all, I wish there was more depth in the plot.

This film tells an honest story about two best friends during the Second World War in the Netherlands. The film is told through the eyes of Hannah, Anne Frank's best friend. You see two teenagers who try to hold their own under sometimes difficult circumstances. It is a film that does not make us forget what happens when one group oppresses another. An absolute must see.

I'm a big movie and history buff, so i often watch movies about 1. And 2. World war, amongst other history themes.

But i'm sad to say, that i was utterly disappointed in this movie.

• It has virtually no meaning. And to make matters worse - you can't understand half of the movie, as it's not all lines that are translated.

You can tell it's low budget.. Lot of talking and very little excitement. The girl that plays Anna Frank is overacting and places Anne Frank badly. She reminds most Dutch of Emma Wortelboer during Song Festival Finals 2019..

In her world-wide famous diary ,Anne Frank adressed to an imaginary friend she called Kitty ; in real life ,she had a true friend Hannah; the film depicts the deeply moving story of their friendship, which ,in spite of Anne's death ,survived ;"she's still my best friend " says Hannah,still alive in 2022 at 93.

Alternating scenes in occupied Netherlands and in the concentration camp ,the movie is never boring,as an user wrote .Although they came from well-to-do families ,chiefly Anne, they suffered the same humiliations as their coreligionists : the infamous yellow star (which was not the Nazi's invention:in the thirteenth century ,French king Louis IX aka Saint louis forced the Jews to wear the "rouelle "(a badge with a small wheel on it) ,the places forbidden to the Jews, the brutality and the contempt of the German soldiers ("it stinks over here") , the Jews were hardly allowed to breathe ;someone wrote that the movie was too nice : the way the Nazi officer treats the pregnant woman,nice? The propaganda movies telling the Dutch they were betrayed by their allies and deprived of their dairy products ? The soldiers forcing their way into the houses ,at any time of day or night?

And still, in this nightmarish world,hope against hope did survive ;Anna would dream of Hollywood , she would be famous ;A Florence Nightingale 's admirer ,Hannah wanted to be a nurse. In the end, both had their vow..

Anne Frank meant as much as her own family to Hannah ;when the former disappeared , she did believe that her friend had fled to Switzerland where she was skiing .This makes their brief reunion all the more poignant .Meeting your dearest friend in hell ,is there something worse?

Both actresses give restrained moving performance :Aiko Beemsterboer 's ressemblance between her and her character are striking ,much more than Millie Perkins' in George Stevens' version (1959)The rapport she has with her co-star Josephine Arendsen gives the movie its outstanding emotional strength.

I was so looking forward to this film but I only lasted half way before I had to turn it off. The film was so slow and boring. I also got woke vibes coming from the two girls which isn't really relevant either way and adds nothing to the film. So disappointing.