Silence

[Gold Trumpet]

Rejoice! I don't think DiCaprio can be nudged into this project!

Martin Scorsese Screams In "Silence"
Posted:   Monday November 14th, 2005 5:34pm
Source:   Variety
Author:   Garth Franklin 


 
Martin Scorsese is aiming to make Japan-set passion project "Silence" his next film, the helmer declared Sunday at the fifth Marrakech Film Festival in Morocco reports Variety.

Adaptation of a Japanese novel by Shusaku Endo is the martyrdom-themed tale of two 17th century Portuguese missionaries who return to Japan to minister to Christians, who've been outlawed. Scorsese has been trying to do the project on and off for around ten years.

Project is being moved by Initial Entertainment Group, the same company who are producing Scorsese's current project "The Departed". Both films are expected to be released by Warner Bros.

[cowboykurtis]

    

US filmmaker Scorsese wants to quit making Hollywood blockbusters
MARRAKECH, Morocco (AFP) -

US filmmaker Martin Scorsese said he plans to stop directing Hollywood blockbusters and focus on documentaries and short films.

Scorsese, director of such hit films as "Raging Bull", "Goodfellas" and "The Aviator", was one of the honored guests at the Marrakech International Film
Festival, which opened Friday and runs until November 19. The director who turns 63 this week said at a press conference that he was getting old and did not want to spend his time making big pictures demanded by Hollywood studios.

He predicted that the film he would make in Japan next year, to be titled "Silence", would be one of his last efforts for Hollywood. The movie will tell the story of Portuguese priests who go to Japan in the 17th century to convert the country to Christianity.  The American director said he wants to focus on documentaries like the one he did recently of US folk music legend Bob Dylan.

Scorsese, who said he liked films from different perspectives, saluted the work of Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami, who is also attending the Marrakech festival.

[MacGuffin]

Scorsese returns to Morocco for film festival

Martin Scorsese has returned to Morocco to repay a debt by attending the opening of the fifth Marrakech International Film Festival, where he is the star attraction.

The festival is honoring Scorsese with a retrospective of his work, including the two films he shot on location in the Arab kingdom: "The Last Temptation of Christ" and "Kundun."

"I owe a great deal to Morocco, which left a lasting impression on my work and my life," he told the opening-night audience Friday.

Referring indirectly to current political tensions, Scorsese made an impassioned defense of world cinema.

"Now more than ever we need to talk to each other, to listen to each other and understand how we see the world, and cinema is the best medium for doing this," said Scorsese, who will give a master class in filmmaking.

[modage]

Scorsese Prefers Silence Next
Source: Variety

Martin Scorsese is aiming to make Japan-set passion project Silence his next film, reports Variety.

The adaptation of a Japanese novel by Shusaku Endo is the martyrdom-themed tale of two 17th century Portuguese missionaries who return to Japan to minister to Christians, who've been outlawed.

The project is being developed by Initial Entertainment Group's chief Graham King. Initial produced the Martin Scorsese-directed The Departed and co-financed Gangs of New York, selling overseas rights.

"I hope it comes together. I've been trying to make the movie for 10 years," Scorsese said. He had originally intended to direct it after "Gangs" but then "got distracted by the informing theme of 'Departed,' " he added.

[w/o horse]

Reports are coming in from all over the wire.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to say that gentlemen.

[Gold Trumpet]

We just jinxed this movie getting made.

[Gamblour.]

Time for a title change, because Saw genius James Wann is on it: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455760/

[theyarelegion]

Thelma Schoonmaker interview
http://www.timeout.com/film/news/659.html

Snipet about "Silence":

Do you have any idea what you will be doing next?

A movie called 'Silence', which is based on a great Japanese novel about 16th century Portuguese missionaries in Japan. It's something very close to Scorsese's heart – he's wanted to make it for many years but he's never really had the time to write the script and get it funded. But we're all hoping that this time it's going to happen, and it looks like we're going to shoot it in New Zealand as well. That will be very exciting, and I think I will have to do a lot of research for that one!

[MacGuffin]

'Silence' is golden for Scorsese
Source: Production Weekly

Martin Scorsese is aiming to make his next film "Silence," an adaptation of the novel by Japanese writer Shusaku Endo, the project is likely to shoot in Vancouver next summer. This is a long-gestating project for Scorsese, who together with Jay Cocks wrote a first draft of a screenplay around a decade ago. He had originally intended to direct it after "Gangs of New York" but instead decided to make "The Departed."

"Silence" is set in sixteenth century Japan, where Portuguese missionaries must contend with traders from rival European nations and the persecution of Christians by Japanese feudal lords. The feudal lords want to drive Christianity out of Japan, and try to do so by torturing priests into apostasy, denying their faith. This is done symbolically by stepping on a "fumie," a Christian image, like a picture of Mary or a crucifix. Two Portuguese priests, Sebastian Rodrigues and Francis Garrpe, make a dangerous journey to Japan, both to locate and comfort Japanese converts, and to discover the truth about a supposed apostate priest, Ferreira.

[MacGuffin]

Scorsese says he wants a break from Hollywood

Despite the big early success of his new film "The Departed," Martin Scorsese plans to take a break from Hollywood blockbusters and focus on the adaptation of a Japanese novel for his next work, he said on Sunday.

Scorsese won the only standing ovation so far at the Rome Film Festival with the screening of his modern-day cops versus mobsters thriller starring Jack Nicholson, Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon.

The film, a $90 million remake of the Hong Kong drama "Infernal Affairs," scored the best opening in Scorsese's career at the U.S. box office last weekend, and has been touted as a likely Oscar contender.

Scorsese said he had had no particular problems with Warner Bros. Pictures, the studio behind the film, but that he was finding it harder and harder to work on big productions, and felt Hollywood studios restricted the creativity of directors.

"I think I am finding that when there are very big budgets there is less risk that can be taken," Scorsese told reporters in Rome after a press screening of his film.

He said Warner had been supportive and patient as he shot "an experimental film like 'The Departed', which we only finished three weeks ago."

"But I don't know how much longer that can hold out, with regard to what kind of movie they -- the major studios -- would like to make and the kind of film I'd like to make."

His next project could not be more different from the crime stories he is renowned for. It's an adaptation of Shusaku Endo's novel "Silence" and tells the story of two 17th century Portuguese missionaries.

"It's a small-scale, lower-budget film. I have wanted to do it for 15 years," he said.

But Scorsese said that if he came across another script like "The Departed" and could rely on the same type of budget and freedom to do things his own way, he would not say no.

"I'd be tempted, because it's like a disease. It's like a drug."

[A Matter Of Chance]

Time for a title change, because Saw genius James Wann is on it: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455760/

that's what we call a contradiction

[Gamblour.]

Time for a title change, because Saw genius James Wann is on it: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455760/

that's what we call a contradiction

congrats

[MacGuffin]

Next for Scorsese: 17th-Century Japan

Martin Scorsese came to Cannes on a quest to save world cinema. Once he leaves, the great American filmmaker hopes to get to work on a foreign picture of his own.

Scorsese is turning his sights to a story of missionaries in 17th century Japan. "Silence" is a long-cherished project that he hopes to shoot partially in Japan in summer 2008.

Although it's a period piece, Scorsese thinks it has lessons for America today.

"It raises a lot of questions about foreign cultures coming in and imposing their way of thinking on another culture they know nothing about," Scorsese told The Associated Press on Thursday raising his eyebrows just to make the point absolutely clear.

Scorsese is on a mission for international understanding in Cannes, where he launched his World Cinema Foundation, devoted to preserving and restoring neglected film treasures from around the world.

Ask him what international filmmakers he admires and the list goes on and on, starting with Italian greats such as Roberto Rossellini, Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Bernardo Bertolucci and Marco Bellocchio.

Postwar cinema alone, especially, is a "very rich feast," he said. "It was a great time to be alive, the late '50s, early '60s, and loving the cinema ... I'd like the younger ones to know this is where I got sustenance from, besides the Hollywood cinema."

Scorsese, who's also working on a documentary about the Rolling Stones, thinks American pop culture could use a jolt of outside influence.

"I think as an American, you see all the American films, we feed upon our own culture in a way," he said. "And we just keep digesting it, re-digesting our own culture. After a while there's no return, there's no nourishment, there's no depth. I believe that."

Scorsese's new international foundation is modeled on The Film Foundation, which Scorsese founded in the United States in 1990. He is backed by an advisory board of prominent directors, including the three Mexicans who have become the toast of Hollywood since they garnered 16 Academy Award nominations among them in February.

Guillermo Del Toro ("Pan's Labyrinth"), Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu ("Babel") and Alfonso Cuaron ("Children of Men") signed a moviemaking partnership last week with Universal Pictures worth a reported $100 million.

Scorsese says he hopes studios that cut deals with foreign talent have the best intentions.

"The danger is, (the directors) may have to make one or two films that are more in the Hollywood line ... What I would hope is that studios nourish the nature of the filmmaker that they hire, really, instead of trying to change him or her," Scorsese said.

Scorsese, 64, is busy at Cannes. Earlier Thursday, Scorsese gave a master class for young filmmakers. When the festival wraps up Sunday, he will hand out the award for the best film from a first-time director.

If Scorsese is spending so much time here, it's because Cannes is close to his heart. He calls it the first place "to really recognize ... and welcome me."

The French Riviera festival awarded him its top prize, the Palme d'Or, for "Taxi Driver" back in 1976. It wasn't until three decades later that he finally took home Oscars (for best picture and best director for "The Departed").

[Pubrick]

"It raises a lot of questions about foreign cultures coming in and imposing their way of thinking on another culture they know nothing about," Scorsese told The Associated Press on Thursday raising his eyebrows just to make the point absolutely clear.

he never raised his eyebrows for the departed! except when opening his paycheck.

[Pozer]