SILENCE

Two Jesuit priests, Sebastião Rodrigues (Andrew Garfield) and Francis Garrpe (Adam Driver), travel to seventeenth century Japan which has, under the Tokugawa shogunate, banned Catholicism and almost all foreign contact.

SILENCE refers to the experience of committed believers praying to their god and getting no answer. This is the fundamental core of this profound movie that explores colonialism, culture, spirituality, faith, doubt and human nature from Martin Scorsese (The Wolf of Wall Street), one of the world’s great directors. It’s for thoughtful viewers who don’t mind a slow movie, if it’s a good movie. It’s a demanding and provocative story with powerful performances and evocative cinematography. It has some confronting torture scenes, so be warned. A stunning achievement.