Silence
Director: Martin Scorsese
Screenwriter: Jay Cocks, Martin Scorsese
Cast: Andrew Garfield, Adam Driver, Tadanobu Asano, Yosuke Kubozuka, Shin’ya Tsukamoto, Liam Neeson, Ciarán Hinds
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Rated R | 161 Minutes
Release Date: December 23, 2016 (Limited)

“Lord, why are you silent? Why are you always silent?”

In 1988, at a screening for religious leaders of his new film The Last Temptation of Christ, Martin Scorsese was approached by Archbishop Paul Moore, the Episcopal Bishop of New York, who presented the filmmaker with a copy of ShÅ«saku Endō‘s acclaimed novel Silence.

Published in 1966, the novel is the story of Jesuit missionaries sent to 17th century Japan, where they endure persecution in the time of Kakure Kirishitan (“Hidden Christians”) that followed the defeat of the Shimabara Rebellion, an uprising of Catholic Christian peasants during the Tokugawa shogunate’s rule.