Martin Scorsese’s SILENCE tells the story of two Christian missionaries (Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver) who face the ultimate test of faith when they travel to Japan in search of their missing mentor (Liam Neeson) – at a time when Christianity was outlawed and their presence forbidden. The celebrated director’s 28-year journey to bring Shusaku Endo’s 1966 acclaimed novel to life will be in theaters this Christmas.
Martin Scorsese previously directed films dealing extensively with religion, The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) and Kundun (1997). Scorsese’s attempts at making Silence date back to 1990. The original novel of the same name (Chinmoku in its original Japanese) was first published to critical acclaim in 1966. Scorsese has described the book as “it’s a strong, wonderful true story”. However, while based on the exploits of Giuseppe Chiara, the book is historical fiction.
Andrew Garfield appears to carry most of the film as the lead, Sebastião Rodrigues, loosely based on Chiara. Despite his acting accolades, Garfield doesn’t have the best box office track record. Sony was disappointed with his last Spider-Man film and his first lead action film since, Hacksaw Ridge, has only earned $57.2 million in five weeks. Rounding out the cast known to mainstream American audiences are Liam Neeson and Adam Driver although with almost a whole year since Star Wars: The Force Awakens was released, Driver has been out of sight, out of mind to most movie-goers.
Of course, it is a film by Martin Scorsese and that’s all a lot of people need to know before wanting to see it. Notice how the teaser trailer was released just about a month before the actual film.
Silence is released in the United States on December 23, 2016.
