Silence

Silence

Father Ferreira

Father Francisco Garrpe

Riccardo

Kichijiro

When the project was announced, Daniel Day-Lewis, Gael García Bernal and Benicio Del Toro were cast in the lead roles. Day-Lewis was originally set to play Father Ferreira, Bernal was initially set to play Father Rodrigues, & Del Toro was formerly set to play Father Francisco Garrpe. They all dropped out of the project after repeated delays in the production's development. Del Toro and Vernal were replaced by Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver respectively while Liam Neeson replaced Day-Lewis.

The story is based on actual historical facts, but while keeping the character name of the hero's mentor Father Ferreira who was an actual historical figure, author Shusaku Endo changed the nationality of hero who historically was an Italian called Giuseppe Cara to Portuguese, thus making him the same nationality as Ferreira, and gave him the fictional name of Sebastian Rodrigo (in the English translation, translated as Rodrigues).

During the Pre-Production of this film, a ceiling collapsed on set and resulted in the death of a Taiwanese contractor, Martin Scorsese was said to be upset and shocked by the incident.