Trivia / Silence

• Acclaimed Flop: Was critically acclaimed and the audiences who did see it liked it, with the film being listed among Scorsese's best. But thanks to Screwed by the Network, the film didn't make much money at the box-office.
• Box Office Bomb: Opened to lower numbers than expected, and against a 50 million dollar budget to boot. The lack of award buzz, Paramount's stunningly horrendous marketing (a trailer came out a month before release) and lengthy runtime were all cited for its low opening. It doesn't help that it opened in a very crowded weekend, and against the crowd-pleasing Hidden Figures and the similarly-themed Hacksaw Ridge, which ironically also starred Andrew Garfield. And considering this was Martin Scorsese's passion project, its bombing gets even sadder.
• California Doubling: Much of the film was not shot in Japan, but in Taiwan. The reason is much of the period and landscape has drastically changed.
• Doing It for the Art: Martin Scorsese surrendered his fees for the making of this film, and the major actors all worked for union scale on this project, as did many others.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver lost 40 and 50 pounds, respectively, in preparation for their roles.
• Fake Nationality: The British Andrew Garfield, the American Adam Driver, and Northern-Irish Liam Neeson and Ciarán Hinds are cast as Portuguese priests. Only Neeson keeps his natural voice.
• Saved from Development Hell: Martin Scorsese first read the novel in the late 80s and has waited a whopping 26 years to make this film. At various times he planned to make this film after Gangs of New York and he kept restarting the project between The Departed and The Wolf of Wall Street before finally getting it made in 2016.
• Screwed by the Network: Rather than have a 2017 release (Scorsese just finished editing two months before release), due to awards potential, Paramount gave it a Christmas release, had it playing in fewer theaters then the other awards contenders and gave it minimal advertising. Even when they expanded the amount of theatres later on, it was too late and the film became a flop.
• What Could Have Been: Had Scorsese made this in the early nineties, he planned to cast Tatsuya Nakadai as the governor Inoue. After The Departed, a production deal had been announced with Benicio del Toro as Rodrigues and Daniel Day-Lewis as Ferreira.^note In a curious irony, Liam Neeson was originally cast as Lincoln, so the two of them exchanged roles.

---