Martin Scorsese: 'Cinema is gone'
By Jake Coyle
AP Film Writer
..."Silence" is a solemn,
religious epic about Jesuit priests (Andrew Garfield, Adam Driver) in a
violently anti-Catholic 17th century Japan. Scorsese has wanted to make
it for nearly 30 years. He was given the book it's based on, Shusaku
Endo's 1966 novel, by a bishop after a screening of his famously
controversial "The Last Temptation of Christ" in 1988.
"Silence" is an examination of belief and doubt and mysterious acts of faith. But making the film was such an act in itself.
"Acting
it out, maybe that's what existence is all about," Scorsese says of his
faith. "The documentary on George Harrison I made, 'Living in the
Material World,' that says it better. He said if you want an old man in
the sky with a beard, fine. I don't mean to be relativist about it. I
happen to feel more comfortable with Christianity. But what is
Christianity? That's the issue and that's why I made this film."...
AP
---
Shusaku Endo's novel
Silence, first published in 1966, endures
as one of the greatest works of twentieth-century Japanese literature.
Its narrative of the persecution of Christians in seventeenth-century
Japan raises uncomfortable questions about God and the ambiguity of
faith in the midst of suffering and hostility. Endo's
Silence
took internationally renowned visual artist Makoto Fujimura on a
pilgrimage of grappling with the nature of art, the significance of pain
and his own cultural heritage. His artistic faith journey overlaps with
Endo's as he uncovers deep layers of meaning in Japanese history and
literature, expressed in art both past and present. He finds connections
to how faith is lived in contemporary contexts of trauma and glimpses
of how the gospel is conveyed in Christ-hidden cultures. In this world
of pain and suffering, God often seems silent. Fujimura's reflections
show that light is yet present in darkness, and that silence speaks with
hidden beauty and truth.
---
