By Everyone loves Martin Scorsese, don’t they? He’s one of the few great ’70s directors to keep developing his outstanding talent into old age, rather than tailing off into ignominy like Lucas, Allen, Coppola and (to a lesser extent) Spielberg. Unfortunately, Cecchi Gore Studios are less than delighted with Marty, whom they’re suing for allegedly reneging on an agreement to direct Shusaku Endo’s novel Silence.
They claim Scorsese has repeatedly put off making the movie by taking on such projects as Shutter Island, The Departed, and has yet to pay his delay fee for doing Hugo. Scorsese calls the claims ‘absurd’ and ‘shocking’, suggesting them to be nothing more than a ‘media stunt’ by the studio on the eve of his starting a new picture, Wolf Of Wall Street. It’s a shame, because Silence sounds fascinating: the story of missionaries sent to 17th century Japan to investigate stories of Christians being tortured by the emperor. The novel is close to Scorsese’s heart, as he nearly became a priest prior to his filmmaking career, so hopefully this mess can be amicably sorted and he will get a chance to shoot the movie after all.
[via Collider]