Paul KeenanFilming on Silence, the epic tale of Jesuit priests struggling to spread the Faith in 17th-Century Japan begins in September, with Ireland’s Liam Neeson in the lead role.
Earlier this year it was confirmed that, following years of delay on the project, the Martin Scorsese-directed film will finally reach the screen, telling the story of a young Jesuit, Fr Rodrigues, as he travels to Japan to find his mentor, Fr Ferreira, who may have lost his faith during the time of the Tokugawa shogunate, one extremely hostile to Western ideas.
Neeson takes the role of the troubled Fr Ferreira, with Spiderman star Andrew Garfield playing Fr Rodrigues. The Catholic Neeson, who has portrayed Catholic priests twice in films already, has spoken previously of his faith and how it helped him through the tragic loss of his wife, Natasha, in 2009.
Originally penned as a novel in 1966 by Japanese Catholic writer Shusaku Endo, Silence examines the idea of God’s own apparent silence when a Christian faces adversity.
The story has been a planned adaptation by Scorsese since the 1990s. In preparing for the September shoot – in Taiwan – Scorsese has enlisted the help of Fr Renzo de Luca SJ, director of the Martyrs Museum in Nagasaki in recreating ‘Jesuit Japan’ for Silence.