L ifestyle /C ulture
‘My Best Friend Anne Frank’ Misses Opportunities
FI L M
SASHA ROGELBERG | JE STAFF
THOSE ONE DEGREE of
separation from Anne Frank
have made their way into
headlines in recent weeks:
Dutch Jewish notary Arnold
van den Bergh, who allegedly
betrayed the Frank family by
reporting their whereabouts
to Nazis officials, a potential
foe; and Hannah Goslar — a
friend — Holocaust survivor
and schoolmate of Frank’s in
Amsterdam, whose story is most
recently depicted in the film “My
Best Friend Anne Frank,” now
streaming on Netflix.

“My Best Friend Anne
Frank,” directed by ​​
Ben Sombogaart, oscillates between
scenes of Hannah (Josephine
Arendsen) navigating the
beginnings of Nazi rule in
Amsterdam in tandem with
the trials and tribulations of
teen-dom and surviving the
horrors of the Bergen-Belsen
concentration camp in 1945,
where she takes on the role of
parent to younger sister Gabi,
while still a child herself, only
16 years old.

Hannah and Anne (Aiko
Beemsterboer), young teens
more concerned with wooing
blond-haired, blue-eyed
boys than with the ongoing
Second World War, are given
an unwelcome dose of reality
as they are told more and
more often by their parents
to keep a low profile and to
avoid picking up the phone
or leaving the house — lest
someone dangerous spots the
bright yellow cloth stars sewn
onto their cardigans.

Despite both being young
Jewish girls growing up in
the Netherlands, Hannah
and Anne couldn’t be more
different. Hannah is shy and
blushes deeply when she’s
teased by classmates who ask
her how her mother became
pregnant. She wants to become
26 FEBRUARY 24, 2022
a nurse but is sensitive and
naive to the way the world
works. Anne is keen on taking
Hannah outside of her comfort
zone. Growing up with older
sister Margot, Anne is knowl-
edgeable, confident and outgoing.

She instigates kerfuffles with
Hannah, often being the first to
tease her on her childlikeness,
but also the first to apologize
and the first to ask Hannah for
help when she’s in a tight spot.

As quickly as their friend-
ship is established, it is stripped
away from them as the war
and the film escalate. Hannah
believes the Frank family flees
to Switzerland for a skiing
vacation that she was uninvited
from, and Hannah, baby sister
Gabi and father Hans Goslar
are captured by Nazis and sent
to Bergen-Belsen, where they
are separated.

In the days leading to the
camp’s liberation, Hannah’s
sole mission becomes to find
extra food to send over to a sick
Anne, who is in a different part
of the camp with harsher living
conditions. The title of the film, though
enticing to audiences, is
misleading, as the film features
modest screentime between
Hannah and Anne. Their
friendship serves as a plot device
to thread together Hannah’s
experiences before and during
the Holocaust, both of which
are punctuated by moments of
friendship with Anne.

In its efforts to bill itself
as a film about their relation-
ship, “My Best Friend Anne
Frank” instead tries to weave
together the narratives of two
complex characters, both of
whose stories fall flat.

Meaningful questions about
Hannah and her family are
left unanswered, particularly
as her family is given a way to
escape the camp. Due to the
family’s possession of Palestine
exchange papers, a detail not
explained in the film, they are
From left: Aiko Beemsterboer
and Josephine Arendsen as Anne
Frank and Hannah Goslar in “My
Best Friend Anne Frank”
Josephine Arendsen as Hannah
Goslar in “My Best Friend Anne
Frank” Courtesy of Dutch FilmWorks/IMDb
permitted to be exchanged
with a German prisoner of war.

According to a 1997 Scholastic
interview with Goslar, the
Goslar family also had
passports from Paraguay, and
their documentation allowed
them to occupy a part of the
camp that was exempt from the
Holocaust’s worst horrors.

Goslar is also originally
from Berlin; the family moved
to Amsterdam after a failed
attempt to move to England.

With little contextual infor-
mation about Hannah, the
film falls short in painting
her as a full-fledged character,
especially one independent
of Anne, whose story is so
well-documented. JEWISH EXPONENT
For a film that woefully
neglects plot points, “My Best
Friend Anne Frank” pays
refreshing attention to detail,
breathing life into a Holocaust
narrative that has been mirrored
in past films such as “The Boy in
the Striped Pajamas” and “The
Devil’s Arithmetic.”
The Jewish mourning
tradition of tearing clothing
depicted in the film is evocative.

Hannah can’t pass a threshold
of a room without kissing the
mezuzah, even retrograding a
couple of steps to make sure
she fulfills the mitzvah. In
these small moments, the film
reminds the audience of the
Jewish people’s deep commit-
ment to tradition, even in the
face of extreme adversity.

The story of Hannah as
depicted by “My Best Friend
Anne Frank” is a true reminder
of the humanity of those who
endured the Shoah. Beyond
being resilient and heroic,
survivors — particularly
children — are still human:
impetuous, impulsive and
misguided at times.

In its effort to tell the story
of two girls over several years,
“My Best Friend Anne Frank”
spreads itself a little too thin,
the important reminder of the
Shoah diluted by the film’s lack
of restraint. l
srogelberg@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0741
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



L ifestyle /C ulture
Concert to Celebrate Yiddish Language, Culture
M USIC
SASHA ROGELBERG | JE STAFF
THE YIDDISH BALLAD “A
brivele der mamen” dates to
more than a century ago, written
during a time of uncertainty
for many Jewish families who
became separated; while some
braved the journey to Ellis Island
to build a new life in the United
States, others stayed behind
in Eastern European shtetls,
awaiting good news and money
from their loved ones overseas.

In the song, a mother requests
that her son, who recently
immigrated to New York, write
her a letter to let her know that
he’s alive and well — “Nisht
farges dayn mamen,” she pleads,
“Don’t forget your mother.”
The lesson of the song is similar
to that of Harry Chapin’s “Cat’s
in the Cradle,” and both espouse
the message of the importance of
always treasuring the relationship
between parent and child, lest it
becomes too late.

Though “A brivele der mamen”
is more than 100 years old, Temple
Adath Israel on the Main Line
Cantor Elizabeth Shammash still
believes it’s a song that should be
heard by today’s audiences and
is a reflection of the enduring
relevance of Yiddish.

“Yiddish is alive and well,”
she said.

Shammash will perform “A
brivele der mamen” on March
2 and 3 in Philadelphia as part
of “Yiddishe Nightingale,” a
multimedia concert celebrating
Yiddish music and history.

Baltimore-based Beth El
Congregation Cantor Thom
King and National Yiddish
Theatre Folksbiene Artistic
Director Zalmen Mlotek will
perform alongside Shammash.

The program is part of
Philadelphia-based nonprofit
Lyric Fest’s 2022 season, meaning
it will be heard by both Jewish
and non-Jewish audiences.

“We’re thrilled that this is
going to reach not only the Jewish
community in the environs
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Cantors Thom King and Elizabeth
Shammash (standing) rehearsing with
National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene Artistic
Director Zalmen Mloktek
but also the song community
that comes to our concerts to
learn new things and hear these
stories,” Lyric Fest founder
and Artistic Director Suzanne
DuPlantis said.

The concert gets its name
from “Yiddishe Nightingale,”
a song by Irving Berlin that
inspired DuPlantis.

The program was funded largely in
part by Jewish donor Michael
Leeds and will be Lyric Fest’s
first Yiddish show.

The performance’s broad
audience underlies the poten-
tial universal impact of Yiddish,
performers said.

“Whether they understand the
words or not, there’s something
about the music; there’s
something about the musical
themes themselves — based on
the modes, based on many, many,
many songs that were written as
folk songs as just pure expressions
of people’s feelings,” Mlotek said.

Though knowledge of
Yiddish is not required for
attendance, English supertitles
will be projected on the stage
for each song.

The music performed will
range from traditional nignim
(melodies) from the mid-1800s to
King’s performance of the Yiddish
version of “If I Were a Rich Man”
Cantor Elizabeth Shammash of Temple Adath Israel on the
Main Line
Courtesy of Elizabeth Shammash
music was a departure from
their usual repertoire.

“Yiddish is a folk language. ...

It’s not liturgical, so much as it is
sort of — I like to think of them
as devotional pieces,” King said.

Through song, audiences can
get the “flavor” of the Yiddish
language, Shammash said.

“It’s just such a beautiful, fun,
expressive language,” she said.

“The music is really the same.”
The concert will take place
on March 2 at the Academy of
Vocal Arts and on March 3 at
Adath Israel. Both performances
begin at 7 p.m. The program will
debut on March 1 at Beth El
Congregation in Baltimore. Proof
of COVID vaccination, including
a booster shot, is required for
entry. The March 3 concert is free
for Adath Israel members. l
from the Folksbiene’s 2018 adapta-
To Shammash and King,
tion of “Fiddler on the Roof.”
both of whom have cantorial srogelberg@jewishexponent.com;
Performed in chronological backgrounds, learning Yiddish 215-832-0741
order, the songs reflect 150 years
of Yiddish history, Mlotek said:
Yiddish songs were performed as
part of Purim spiels in Russia and
Poland in the mid-19th century
As seen in the
and evolved into operettas that
Netflix series
reflected life and history.

Pretend During the time of Jewish
It’s A City
immigration to the U.S.,
the music, like “A brivele der
mamen,” reflected changing
family structures, culture and
assimilation. As more Jews assimilated
in the U.S., English made its
way into Yiddish theater music;
in Europe, Jews wrote Yiddish
lullabies to soothe their young
children enduring the trauma of
the Holocaust.

“Each one (song) has its own
particular, interesting story,”
Mlotek said.

According to Shammash, the
music is just as relevant as ever.

“We’re not
reviving something dead,” Shammash
said. “This issue of immigration
is front and center: How do we
treat the stranger? How do we
PROUD KIMMEL CULTURAL
CAMPUS SEASON SPONSOR
welcome the refugee? What was
it like under Trump? What is
KimmelCulturalCampus.org happening now? It’s amazing
how it’s absolutely still topical.”
Author, Humorist
& Social
Observer Sat, Mar 19
JEWISH EXPONENT
FEBRUARY 24, 2022
27