Jude Law’s latest movie at the Venice Film Festival, a true story of white supremacists plotting a race war, is one that “needed to be made now”, its star said Saturday. “The Order”, directed by Australian director Justin Kurzel, stars the British actor as a gruff FBI agent in the Pacific Northwest confronted with a splinter group of the Aryan Nations which is building a militia to wage war on the American government.

“Sadly, the relevance I think speaks for itself,” Law told journalists ahead of the movie’s premiere Saturday. “It felt also like a piece of work that needed to be made now. It’s always interesting looking back but it’s also interesting finding a piece from the past that has some relationship to the present day,” said the actor.

The film — one of 21 competing for the top Golden Lion prize at the prestigious festival — is based on the real-life group of the same name which operated in Washington and Idaho in 1983-1984 under its leader Robert Mathews. “What amazed me was that it was a story I hadn’t heard of before,” confessed Law, known for a string of leading roles including “The Young Pope” and “The Talented Mr. Ripley”.

‘Dangerous ideology’

The threat from violent, extremist far-right groups is in the forefront this year after a summer of anti-immigrant violence and riots in Britain, the worst since 2011. There are also concerns of a repeat of the January 6, 2021 Capitol Hill attack — whose rioters included white nationalists and other extremist groups — if former US President Donald Trump loses the election in November. The 40-year-old true story provided the filmmakers with a way to “have a conversation with today’s politics” given that the film is about “an ideology that’s incredibly dangerous and how it can quickly take seed,” said director Kurzel.

Kurzel, whose most recent “Nitram” won a 2021 Best Actor award at Cannes for actor Caleb Landry Jones, has called his latest film “a manhunt into the depths of that hate, a foreshadowing of a divided America, a warning shot of what has been and what may come.” That hate is seen straight away at the top of the film when a Denver radio talk show host berates a caller who has been goading him for being Jewish. “You’re too inept to get by in the world so you try to curtail the enjoyment of others,” says host Alan Berg, who will later become a victim of The Order as part of their quest for racial purity.

Meanwhile, the group has been robbing banks and printing counterfeit money to build its army against the state. FBI agent Terry Husk (Law) makes a connection between “White Power” flyers going up in town and the robberies and armored car heists, realizing he is up against a dangerous splinter group with Butler as its young, charismatic leader, played by Nicholas Hoult. With a young sheriff deputy Jamie Bowen (Tye Sheridan) at his side, Husk begins tracking the elusive leader, who has in his sights far more serious crimes, from attacks on government institutions to assassinations.

“What was shocking to me and I think to all of us here was there were so many comparisons and I think so many things within the film were the seed and the germination of today and many of the challenges we face,” said Kurzel of his latest film. “I think we live in a time now that was reflected in the film where there is division and there’s a lot of conversation about the future and ideologies,” he said. The Order’s leader Mathews, who died in a fire in a stand-off with law enforcement officers in December 1984, had a particular ability of “speaking to the disenfranchised, those who feel invisible, who are unheard,” said Kurzel. “That voice... can very dangerously start to exploit that vulnerability. I think that’s a timeless thing.” — AFP