Set in the 1980s, Aussie filmmaker Justin Kurzel’s dark and gripping film The Order feels like it could be easily set today, proving that white supremacists brandishing firearms isn’t anything new in the good ol’ US of A.
An almost unrecognizable Jude Law (as he’s been in several films recently) plays Terry Husk an irascible FBI agent who has taken on the KKK and the Mafia. Husk is hell bent on destroying this growing Pacific Northwest militia before it has time to increase in numbers and cause real damage. He teams up with Jamie Bowen (an excellent, understated Tye Sheridan), the only local cop who seems to see the group as a threat.
The growing Neo-Nazi gang known as The Order is led by cocky Bob Matthews (Nicholas Hoult, who bears a striking resemblance in features and demeanor to a young Jude Law!) He and his fellow Aryans have a terrifying master plan in place taken from the 1978 neo-Nazi novel The Turner Diaries. The film follows both Husk and Mathews on their divergent but soon convergent journeys.
The Order is inspired by Kevin Flynn and Gary Gerhardt’s 1989 non-fiction book The Silent Brotherhood: The Chilling Inside Story of America’s Violent, Anti-Government Militia Movement, which was originally published by the Free Press on Jan. 1, 1989.
Kurzel’s last film was Nitram, the disturbing 2021 Cannes-award winning drama about the events leading up to 1996 Tasmanian massacre. The helmer does a grand job here balancing taut character study with edge of your seat thrills, never losing sight of just how insidious hatred is and how easily it can spread.
In a key moment in The Order, Richard Butler (Victor Slezak), the white nationalist founder the Aryan Nations, tries to explain to Matthew’s that violence is not the way to proceed and that in 10 years they’ll have plenty of their people in Congress. This had me wondering just how many white supremacists currently serve in the House of Representatives, the Senate…or even on the Supreme Court.
A truly frightening thing to ponder.
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