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Full-Text Articles in American Studies
Rose-Colored Genocide: Hollywood, Harmonizing Narratives, And The Cinematic Legacy Of Anne Frank’S Diary In The United States, Nora Nunn
Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal
Drawing from literary and cultural studies, this paper situates U.S. adaptations of Anne Frank’s diary in the 1950s within a lineage of other films about historical genocide, including Schindler’s List, Hotel Rwanda, and The Killing Fields. Analysis of these narrative adaptations matters because it helps us better understand the danger of what critic Dominick LaCapra calls “harmonizing narratives,” or stories that provide the viewer with an “unwarranted sense of spiritual uplift” (14). Tracing the metamorphosis of Frank’s own diary from play to film adaptation, this article builds on existing scholarship to focus on how, in the wake …