Israeli director Ari Folman dedicates his animated film WHERE IS ANNE FRANK? to the moving fate of the Jewish German-Dutch girl Anne Frank. The film was initiated by the Anne Frank Foundation, which was founded by Anne‘s father Otto, with the goal of reaching the young generation in these times of growing antisemitism and racism.

After Anne receives a diary for her 13th birthday on June 12th 1942, she decides to write her entries in letter form to Kitty, an imaginary best friend, who is a good listener and who she can confide in about everything. Many years later, a massive thunderstorm irrupts in Amsterdam. In the Anne Frank House, the world-renowned museum in which Anne‘s diary is exhibited, the protective glass breaks. Kitty comes alive and wonders why Anne and her family aren‘t there. On her search for Anne, Kitty takes to the streets of current-day, wintery-dark Amsterdam, where refugees live in tents near the canals. Kitty befriends Peter, who runs an illegal shelter for refugees, and Awa, a girl who fled war. With the help of the diary, which the whole city is looking for, Kitty keeps traveling back to Anne‘s life, talking to her – and gradually finds out what happened to Anne after her last letter. In WHERE IS ANNE FRANK?, movingly drawn by 2D-animator Lena Guberman, Ari Folman (WALTZ WITH BASHIR) draws a bridge between children like Anne, who had to leave their country during National Socialism, and refugee kids today. Folman, whose parents arrived in Auschwitz on the same week as the Frank family, asks countries like Holland, which haven‘t only memorialized Anne Frank with the Anne Frank House, but also with streets and schools named after her, can implement what they‘ve learned from Anne‘s story in their current approach to refugees.

Stefanie Borowsky

Translation: Elinor Lewy