“High Marks for Scorsese’s ‘Silence’”

Several acquaintances and former students, knowing of our years in Japan, have asked me about the movie “Silence.” Kathy and I finally saw it last evening, and we were deeply appreciative, even thrilled, with how Martin Scorsese has conveyed Endo Shusaku’s 1966 historical novel Silence (沈黙, Chinmoku). The story itself is not at all “thrilling,” of course; better descriptions include “excruciating” and “religiously provocative.” What makes the movie superlative, in my view, is what Scorsese has don, and refrained from doing, in order to communicate Endo’s complex message in Silence. I will get to those particulars shortly.

The message of Silence is difficult succinctly to articulate. It deals with religious faith, interreligious encounter, and imperial conflict – as particularly manifest in Japan beginning almost a half-millennium ago. Endo’s message in Silence can also be understood autobiographically, as he tried to integrate his Japanese and Catholic identities (at that time in his 40’s). Silence is Endo’s most widely-known work, but it is by no means his only or even best one. (Theologically, I think Endo’s 1980 Samurai, with more crystallized Christology, offers even more discussion points.) For a general audience, however, Silence offers a compelling entryway into Endo and the beginning stages of Christian history and of European presence in Japan. Again, I believe Scorsese’s “Silence” leads viewers through that entrance faithfully, appropriately, and meaningfully.

I will not try and offer here either a summary of Silence or a movie review per se. You can easily find many elsewhere (two of which I link in the next paragraph). As you would expect, I recommend reading the novel if you have not already done so. If you have not yet seen the move in a theater you have missed your chance, since its lack of box office draw is causing many theaters to cut short its anticipated longer showing dates. I also recommend that you read a little about Endo Shusaku himself (at least the Wikipedia version). While you’re at it, look into Scorsese and his long-time interest in making this movie, e.g., here.

One movie critic is appreciative yet writes, “’Silence’ is not a great movie…. Though undeniably gorgeous, it is punishingly long, frequently boring, and woefully unengaging at some of its most critical moments. It is too subdued for Scorsese-philes, too violent for the most devout, and too abstruse for the great many moviegoers who such an expensive undertaking hopes to attract. Another insightful reviewer, in comparing the movie’s relative Oscar-snub to the several nominations of “Hacksaw Ridge,” labels “Silence” as “the finest movie of 2016, and one that will be recognized belatedly as one of Scorsese’s greatest achievements. But at the present moment, ‘Silence’ represents a challenging sit for audiences – and sadly, this too often includes Oscar voters – who see intellectual engagement and moral ambiguity as the enemy, rather than the enabler, of great cinema.” I think this paradoxical greatness of the movie and its lack of Oscar voters’ and audiences’ attention lie in what I came away liking the most about “Silence,” namely in how Scorsese has faithfully conveyed Endo.

My basic skepticism when I first heard about the movie was whether the U.S.-American Scorsese could even approach understanding, much less communicating, Endo’s nuanced, Japanese-Catholic complexity. After viewing the movie last night I was elated having recognized Endo’s message, including through some of the climactic events toward the end. That the movie is basically in English was surprisingly not a major deterrent, perhaps there was enough spoken Japanese (and Latin) to help anchor the story in Japan. (Because I do not know personally all of the particular areas in Kyushu where the events would have taken place, I cannot tell if filming the movie in Taiwan detracts from the subtleties of the coastlines, landscapes, fauna, etc.) Also, in my estimation the movie’s few additions to the novel only enhance the overall story, rather than distracting those who know well Endo’s Silence.

A secondary concern I had going into the movie was the degree of violence that would be on display. After all, Scorsese’s films have that kind of track record, and a friend who saw a preview showing of “Silence” had warned me that it was “gruesome.” The book itself does not hide the horror of the persecutions central to the history, so it would not have been surprising if the movie had majored on blood and gore. Thankfully, neither Kathy nor I found the movie to be that way at all – certainly not more so than Endo’s own gut-wrenching, detailed elaborations of Christians’ excruciating suffering at the hands of their persecutors.

Related is how Scorsese has refrained from sensationalizing the violence of the persecutions is the remarkable absence of music from the movie. There is no “normal” music before, after, or for that matter during the entire showing. As one analysis puts it, “The spare, haunting score is a combination of wordless vocalizations, electroacoustic drones, and interwoven sound effects (far-off clangs, wind, waves, crickets [semi], and the like).” Such an “eerie score” helps to convey Endo’s sense of mystery of profundity, rather than amping up the horrific violence intertwined with the story’s persecutions.

There are many other particulars worth mentioning, but here I will note only two more. First, Scorsese’s inclusion of different attitudes among the Jesuits in Japan not only is historically accurate but also true to Endo’s complex message. Second, the movie’s portrayal of Japanese characters – Christians, persecutors, and otherwise – as primary protagonists (not just backdrops to the expatriate priests) further conveys Endo and the reality of what was actually happening during those early decades of the Tokugawa Shogunate.

I encourage those who see the movie not to conclude that they therefore understand Japan or the history of Christianity in Japan. I also encourage not solely fixating on some of the key summary phrases from the book or movie, including Japan being a “swamp” in which the “Western sapling” of Christianity cannot take root, or “hearing God in the silence” of suffering. Furthermore, in my judgment the type of Japanese-Christian struggle of faith that Endo experienced and communicates should not be interpreted as the only, or the “best,” or the “truest” Christianity in Japan or elsewhere.

Having said all of that, in this blogpost the positive encouragement I want to convey is that Scorsese’s “Silence” is true to Endo’s Silence. To my mind, that faithful rendering is a remarkable achievement to be celebrated.