My Best Friend Anne Frank Trailer: The Real-Life Holocaust Story Heads To Netflix

Netflix is kicking off the month of February with "My Best Friend Anne Frank," a new movie "based on the real-life friendship between Anne Frank and Hannah Goslar, from Nazi-occupied Amsterdam to their harrowing reunion in a concentration camp." The Dutch-language film is based on the YA (young adult) book, "Memories of Anne Frank: Reflections of a Childhood Friend" by Alison Leslie Gold, who also co-authored the adult non-fiction book, "Anne Frank Remembered: The Story of the Woman Who Helped Hide the Frank Family."

First published in 1947 under the title of "The Annex," the book now commonly referred to as "The Diary of Anne Frank" collects the real writings of a young Jewish girl who hid from the Nazis for two years with her family during World War II. They were eventually caught and Frank died of typhus in a concentration camp in 1945, but her writings survived and remain an invaluable firsthand account of the Holocaust. In "My Best Friend Anne Frank," Aiko Beemsterboer stars as Anne, but as its title suggests, the story is told from the point-of-view of Hannah, played by Josephine Arendsen.

"My Best Friend Anne Frank" is already available to stream on Netflix, having released on Tuesday, February 1. However, it's all too easy for films like this to get quickly buried in the pile of endless streaming titles that are on offer via Netflix and other platforms. If you want to get a better idea of what to expect from "My Best Friend Anne Frank" before that happens, check out the trailer below.

The idea of a YA take on "The Diary of Anne Frank" might seem crass at first glance, but Anne Frank's diary itself was written by a young adult and it chronicles a young adult's lived experience. In a way, giving the subject matter this treatment is appropriate. If nothing else, "My Best Friend Anne Frank" might introduce the story to a new generation of young people who are more liable to browse Netflix than peruse an old history book.

Shelley Winters won an Academy Award for her portrayal of Anne in the 1959 film, "The Diary of Anne Frank," adapted from the Pulitzer Prize-winning stage play, and she donated her Oscar to the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam. There have been other adaptations of Frank's story over the years, both onstage and onscreen, and "My Best Friend Anne Frank" now joins them. 

"My Best Friend Anne Frank" is available to stream on Netflix.