Where Is Elle Kari and What Happened to Noriko-san? (Hebrew: איפה אלה קרי ומה קרה לנוריקו-סאן?) is an Israeli documentary by Dvorit Shargal from 2014. It deals with the photo books from the series Children's Everywhere by Anna Riwkin-Brick, Astrid Lindgren, Leah Goldberg and Elly Jannes. Where Is Elle Kari and What Happened to Noriko-san? is the first part of a film trilogy. The follow-up films, which also deal with the photo books from the series Children's Everywhere, were filmed in 2016 (Africa! Sia Lives on Kilimanjaro) and 2017 (Where Is Lilibet the Circus Child and What Happened in Honolulu?).
Plot
As a child, director Dvorit Shargal read Anna Rivkin-Brick's books Elle Kari and Noriko-San: girl of Japan. Through these books she learned about the lives of other girls in other distant countries. She identified with the protagonists, wanted to have skis like Elle Kari from the book of the same name, or wear a kimono like Noriko-san. When she opens her former favorite books, Shargal finds a letter written by her to Noriko-san. This was, however, sent back to her with the note: address unknown. Then she decides to start looking for the protagonists from the books. Noriko-san is of particular importance to her.
The search for Noriko-san, however, is more difficult than expected, after all, Shargal only has a first name. Therefore, she tries to find Ella Kari first, a girl from the indigenous Sámi people and the protagonist of the book with the same name. Shargal actually finds an Elle Kari through an internet search. It turns out that this Elle Kari is the daughter of the writer Elly Jannes. She is named after the protagonist of Anna Riwkin-Brick and Elly Janne's book. After interviewing her, Shargal finally meets Elle Kari from the book. Elle Kari tells about her life, shows more photos of Anna Riwkin-Brick and a documentary about her daughter from the 1970s. In addition, Shargal reports how the indigenous Sámi people developed after the 1950s.
To find out more about Anna Riwkin-Brick, Shargal searches the archive of the Swedish National Library in Stockholm. There she learns that Anna Riwkin wrote books along with the Israeli author Leah Goldberg. In Israel she meets the protagonists Anat, Shaul, Daniel and Miriam from the books Eli lives in Israel and Miriam Lives in a Kibbutz of the Children's Everywhere series.
Later, she continues to search for her favorite protagonist Noriko-san. She learns that the book was written by Astrid Lindgren. Although she does not find any information about Noriko in the Astrid Lindgren Archive in Stockholm, she comes across a letter from the protagonist of the book Dirk lives in Holland, who is not called Dirk, but Jackie. She meets Jackie. He tells her about the work with Anna Riwkin and Astrid Lindgren. In addition, Jackie takes Shargal to the places where the photos were taken. He tells her about his first bicycle, which he had received from Astrid Lindgren for his birthday and reads a letter that Astrid Lindgren had written to him. In it, Astrid Lindgren recalls her visit to Holland, where she created the book together with Anna Riwkin.
When Shargal publicly searches for Noriko-san, she finds Eva, another protagonist from Noriko-san. Together they are looking Noriko-san. They fly to Japan and visit the places where the photos were taken. They also ask locals about Noriko-san and eventually make adds in newspapers. Through a newspaper article they finally find Noriko-san and meet her.
Overview
Where Is Elle Kari and What Happened to Noriko-san? is the debut film of the director Dvorit Shargal. Originally, Shargal worked as a journalist, but gave up her work to make a documentary about her search for the heroines of her childhood from the Children's Everywhere photobook series. Children's Everywhere deals with the lives of children in different countries, such as Sweden, Japan, Israel etc. The director had a particular interest in finding Noriko-san from the book of the same name. But the search was extremely difficult because she had only a first name. During her search, she came across other protagonists from the same book series and tried to find out more about the life of the photographer of the series, Anna Riwkin-Brick.
The documentary has been shot within four years in different countries and continents. Shargal first met Ella Kari in Jokkmokk (Sweden), then she traveled to Israel and Tokyo.
Because of the film nine photo books of the series were being reissued in Israel, including: Elle Kari, Noriko-San: girl of Japan, Sia lives on Kilimanjaro, Lilibet, circus child, Dirk lives in Holland, Noy lives in Thailand, Salima lives in Kashmir, Eli lives in Israel and Gennet lives in Ethiopia.