The Grind of ‘Silence’
It has taken Martin Scorsese nearly thirty years to make “Silence,” his adaptation of Shusaku Endo’s 1966 award-winning novel about spirituality in the face of profound human suffering. In the intermediary, he has released a bevy of less weighty films, most recently “The Wolf of Wall Street,” which treads as far from “Silence” as Donald Trump does from Barack Obama. Yet what distinguishes the Academy Award-winning director’s work is in full effect in both films: a fascination with ritual coupled with an epic scale. True, “Silence” trains its lens on abstinence and self-sacrifice, but it does so with the over-the top commitment with which the “Wolf” stockbrokers snort drugs off hookers’ asses.
Adam Driver and Andrew Garfield play Fathers Garrpe and Rodrigues respectively, two Portuguese Jesuit missionaries searching for Father Ferreira (Liam Neeson), their mentor who has gone missing in Japan. It is the seventeenth century and Christians have been intent on spreading the good word in Asia, whether or not that word is welcome. The rumor is that Ferreira has absolved his faith and taken a Japanese name and wife, but the younger priests feel in their hearts that this is slander and that their teacher needs rescuing. So they set off on a slow boat, armed only with what they can carry on their backs – mostly Christian artifacts. Continue Reading →
When Denzel Dims His Star: ‘Fences’
I’ve never considered Denzel Washington an actor so much as a star. Stars are performers who project their personality and beauty with such charisma that they render even the most mediocre projects appealing. Actors are performers who disappear into roles so completely that they capture essences that were not even written. Some stars are actors – surprisingly, in her later career, Julia Roberts has turned out to be both – but rarely do the two categories overlap. Washington may be one of the most powerful artists working today, but he’s only got one trick, and that trick is dominance. He plays such hero-martyr-mavericks as Malcolm X (an amazing Malcom X, to be fair) and boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter. Even when he’s bad, he’s the baddest bad guy, as in “Training Day,” when he portrays a mega-dirty cop, or in “Flight,” when he takes on the part of an alcoholic pilot who miraculously steers a mechanically faulty passenger plane to safety while blotto on cocaine, screwdrivers, and illicit sex. What we never see him play is a schlub, a man who misses more marks than he makes.
So it’s a welcome surprise to see Washington turn that “large and in charge” quality on its head in “Fences,” an adaptation of the 1985 August Wilson play about a working-class family in 1950s Pittsburgh. Perhaps he’s willing to depict a weak, complicated man here because he’s deeply invested in preserving the integrity of this Pulitzer Prize winner. Perhaps it’s because of his level of familiarity with the material, as both he and costar Viola Davis won Tony Awards for the same roles in a 2010 Broadway revival. Perhaps it’s because he’s also behind the lens; he’s still in control no matter how much underbelly he reveals. My guess is D, all of the above, but whatever the reason, the nuanced disappointment he and his cast channel in this film tells one of the richest stories of 2016 cinema. Continue Reading →
