Where Is Anne Frank is a 2021 animated fantasy film directed by director Ari Folman, based upon the writings of Anne Frank.
During a violent thunder storm in Amsterdam "a year from now" the glass case over one of Anne Frank's diaries in the Anne Frank House museum shatters. The ink on the pages flows out and materialises into a red haired haired young teenage girl in a 1940s dress who reveals herself to be Anne's imaginary friend 'Kitty'. A confused Kitty, now a real girl, begins to explore modern Amsterdam in search of her missing friend - and promptly becomes wanted by the police when she takes the diary with her. While on the run she makes friends with a pickpocket named Peter and meets and befriends modern refugees in a state of fear over being deported back to their war-torn homelands.
While the main narrative follows the now 'real' Kitty, the film also cuts back to the Second World War and Anne and her fellow Jewish refugees in hiding.
This Film contains examples of:
- Ambiguous Situation: At the end of the movie Kitty dissolves after being separated from the diary for so long. It is unclear whether this represents a permanent end for her as a real person, or whether she might reform in some way if 'needed' again.
- Artificial Human: Kitty is intangible and invisible in the Anne Frank House (not a power she consciously controls and seems unable to turn 'off') and starts to 'dissolve' into ink and disappear if separated from Anne's diary for too long but otherwise seems to be a completely normal human girl mentally and physically who just happens to be an imaginary friend brought to life.
- Bittersweet Ending: Kitty manages to help Awa and her family stay in Amsterdam by threatening to burn Anne's diary unless the Dutch government relents in deporting them. However she is separated from the diary too long and at the end of the film dissolves into ink and disappears in front of a distraught Peter.
- Faceless Goons: The faces of the Nazi soldiers are portrayed as white masks with a neutral facial expression.
- Fiery Redhead: Kitty is red haired, determined and confrontational (though kind hearted.) At one point she even questions Anne why she imagined her (Kitty) as so non-Jewish looking, citing her red hair.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: Kitty is from the 1940s and is occasionally confused by modern technology or concepts. At one point she is sitting next to a boy in a darkened theatre who is looking at his smartphone. Kitty politely asks him if she can borrow his "flashlight" to help read her book.
- Hypocrite: This movie holds absolutely no punches about showing how the curators of Anne Frank's memory flat-out treat minorities the same way Nazis did.
- Imaginary Friend: Kitty is (or was) Anne's imaginary friend, though at least in her appearances in modern Amsterdam she is clearly real, interacting with numerous people and having her picture taken and so on.
- Magical Realism: Anne Frank's imaginary friend suddenly and inexplicably comes to life in modern Amsterdam.
- One-Steve Limit: An aversion with both the historical Peter Van Pels (named 'Anne's Peter' in the credits) and a boy named Peter that Kitty meets in modern Amsterdam (named 'Kitty's Peter' in the credits.) The trope is lampshaded with a confused Kitty initially insisting the boy she meets can't be named Peter because she already knew Peter.
