“Scorsese, El Greco, and The Tribulations of The Faithful”

“St. Veronica With The Holy Shroud,” a 16th century portrait of Jesus by the Spanish painter El Greco, appears on numerous occasions in Martin Scorsese’s latest film, Silence. The portrait is first revealed as an apparition to Sebastião Rodrigues, a Jesuit missionary played by Andrew Garfield. In another instance, Rodrigues sees the portrait superimposed over his own reflection as he stares into a stream of water. Evidently, the painting is crucial to Scorsese’s conception of the film. So much so, that the film exhibits many qualities of a great painting. Scorsese and El Greco use similar formal means—saturated colors, religious iconography, and positioning within the frame—to depict an intensely spiritual young man whose life is defined by sacrifice, morality, and faith.

Silence is a story about religion, but it is also—as stories about religion often are—a  story about power. The film recalls the experience of Portuguese Jesuit missionaries in Feudal Japan. The majority of Christian converts depicted in the film are poor and uneducated peasants living in rural areas. These citizens, who endure tremendous hardship in life, are attracted to Christian idea of salvation in the afterlife—a concept for which Buddhism has no equivalent. The ruling Shogun Government perceives in the Jesuits a threat to their own authority and seeks to purge Japan of the missionaries and the gospel they preach through whatever means necessary.

The film begins at a Jesuit outpost in Macau where a pair of young priests played by Adam Driver and Andrew Garfield learn that their mentor, Father Ferreira (Ralph Fiennes) is believed to have been captured and tortured by the Japanese for proselytizing and subsequently renounced his faith. Disbelieving that Ferreira would commit apostasy, the pair travel to Japan in an attempt learn of their mentor’s fate and whereabouts. They encounter a situation even more dire than predicted, a place in which Christians are forced to worship in secrecy for fear of retribution, and (if discovered) persecuted mercilessly.

Little is known of Ferreira. The only certainty is that he has cut ties with the Catholic Church. Rumors abound that he has assumed a Japanese name and married a Japanese woman, but it’s also possible that he is no longer alive. The mysterious circumstances which surround his disappearance are reminiscent of Colonel Kurtz, the crazed special forces commander played by Marlon Brando in Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam War epic Apocalypse Now, who deserts the US Army deep in the Vietnamese jungle in order to lead his own autonomous guerilla force. A similar mechanism is at work in Silence, Ferreira is depicted as a character who is cut off from civilization for such a long period of time that he undergoes a spiritual and moral transformation beyond the possibility of rehabilitation. Put simply, he goes rogue. As in Apocalypse, the plot revolves around trying to find the missing character, with Garfield and Driver assuming that responsibility.

However, the two films recount a similar story in very different ways. Apocalypse, which is loosely based on Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, is a film characterized by a fluid narrative that progresses as the men journey upriver. In Silence, the sense of progression is constrained. The film’s form (its narrative structure) is constructed in accordance with its content (the story it tells). Thus, the two young priests are constantly interrupted, deceived, and thwarted in their efforts to recover Ferreira. The journey to find Ferreira is depicted as an allegory for the journey toward faith itself, a journey characterized by striving and tribulation, and one whose progress is difficult to track.

Rodrigo Prieto, the director of cinematography, works with an ascetic selection of greys, whites, and blacks in Macau and transitions to a slightly more forgiving palette of khakis and indigo in Japan. There are a few remarkable shots, several of which are taken from an overhead “God’s View” perspective—which seems appropriate given the subject-matter. One, in which a decapitated body is dragged across screen leaving a trail of blood red calligraphy, stands out for its morbid intensity.

Yet, in spite of the powerful imagery, the movie struggles to hold the viewer’s attention over the course of its nearly three hour duration. There are a handful of scenes of only marginal significance—scenes that exist as if only to say, “Look how pretty I am!” These scenes—which are ornamental rather than fundamental—could be abbreviated or deleted without detracting from the experience of the film. In these cases, it would be best to heed a maxim of the great Robert Bresson: “Not beautiful photography and not beautiful images; but necessary images and necessary photography.”

Generally speaking, the acting is excellent. Ralph Fiennes piercing gaze has never been as intense as when he witnesses the torture of his fellow missionaries. The Japanese Inquisitor (Issey Ogata) is a devious and volatile character who demands respect. He and Rodrigues debate the validity of the Catholic Church’s presence in Japan in a series of heated discussions. These scenes, in which each man wields logic, rhetoric, and metaphor in such a way that his arguments reflect his education and cultural background, are among the strongest in the film.

There is, however, one major weakness in the cast. Adam Driver delivers an lackluster performance as Father Francisco Garupe, one of the missionaries sent to recover Ferreira. His performance is hampered by a prominent and poorly executed Portuguese accent. Not only is the accent unnecessary—none of the other actors attempt anything similar—it is inaccurate and inconsistent. Often, when a scene reaches peak emotional intensity, Driver will abandon—or perhaps forget—the accent. This makes it all the more jarring when, after a cut, the heinous accent returns. The role of a professional actor is to render emotion through gesture, speech, and movement. Speaking in an accent is not acting, it is something else entirely.  Mr. Driver is a talented actor who should recognize his limitations where accents are concerned and not attempt what he cannot perform.

Silence would also pay heed to listen to the advice of its own title; the film suffers from an overabundance of voice-over. Scorsese is known for his extensive use of the technique, but in this case it is poorly suited to the project. In contrast with Wolf of Wall Street, in which Leonardo DiCaprio’s bombastic commentary helps the audience to understand how so many people were caught up in the charisma of the swindler that they failed to see the swindle, in Silence voice-over simply reiterates what is shown onscreen. In Wolf, the voice-over has a dialectic quality which charges the images with additional meaning. Thus, the audience experiences scenes that depict superabundance in a way that does not glamorize wealth, but hints at its suspect origins and disastrous consequences. Voice-over enables the audience to feel impressed, overwhelmed, and disgusted at the same time. In Silence however, voice-over is redundant, mediating image through text only detracts from its effect.