The Order
Justin Kurzel’s true-life crime thriller highlights an outstanding turn from Jude Law.
Jude Law in action
Image courtesy of Metfilm Distribution.
In 2021 the Australian filmmaker Justin Kurzel gave us Nitram, a film which I described as being his best to date. It was a work based on real life killings that took place in Tasmania in 1996 and as such it was in line with some of Kurzel’s earlier features. The first of them, 2011’s Snowtown, had also been concerned with actual killings (in that case the twelve murders by John Bunting in and around Adelaide in the 1990s) and in 2019 Kurzel turned to Ned Kelly to give us his take on the outlaw, True History of the Kelly Gang. Those were, of course, Australian films and although his latest feature, The Order, is set in America it is in line with those works. Its basis is yet another true story involving violence. In this instance the film is dealing with events that took place in the 1980s and the criminal figure at its centre is Bob Mathews (Nicholas Hoult). Mathews, who had been born in Texas in 1953, grew up to become a neo-Nazi activist. At one stage he was a follower of the founder of the Church of Jesus Christian, Richard Butler (Victor Slezak). That church incorporated what was known as Aryan Nations and saw Butler preaching white supremacist views. But Mathews, even more extreme in how he wanted to pursue those views, favoured acts of terrorism and founded his own group known as The Order in 1983. Kurzel’s film follows the activities of that group in the following months showing how the FBI was able to identify those involved and to track them down.
As told here the central FBI man working on the case, a veteran with twenty-six years of experience but now somewhat feeling the strain, is Terry Husk. He is played by Jude Law who is also one of the film’s producers. Husk is regularly assisted by a local rookie, Jamie Bowen (Tye Sheridan) and collaborates with another agent, Joanne Carney (Jurnee Smollett). While Husk’s work has put a distance between him and his family, we do get to meet Jamie’s wife, Kimmy (Morgan Holmstrom) and their young son. In addition, the film introduces us not only to Mathews and his chief followers but to his wife, Debbie (Alison Oliver), and to his mistress Zillah Craig (Odessa Young). That provides background but the central focus is on the tactics of the order and on the way in which the FBI get closer as they move in on them. There is a further dramatic progression here since we realise that Mathews is taking as his guide the 1978 novel The Turner Diaries by William Luther Pierce. It’s a book that provides a model to follow for what he is planning, starting out with bank robberies and the like in order to build a war chest followed by training in the use of firearms and leading, as he hopes, to bombings, assassinations and ultimately to the execution of anyone opposed to the full establishment of white supremacy in America.
Being a film made all these years after the events depicted, The Order may be said to work on two levels. As a narrative, it offers a crime story made with real expertise. Technically Kurzel is on his best form and with several robberies and killings incorporated the film is masterly in its action sequences (credit here not only to Kunzel but to his editor Nick Fenton). Also adding to its quality is the high standard of acting from the entire cast. In particular, in a year that has also seen great work by Daniel Craig and Ralph Fiennes, it is splendid to find Jude Law taking a comparable route and sinking himself so well into the role of an older character. As for that second level, a statement at the end of The Order refers to the fact that The Turner Diaries has continued to be influential and was indeed referenced by those who attacked the capital building in Washington on 6th January 2021. Given the extremist views widely found in America today, this film’s emphasis on the hatred and injustice inherent in the white supremacist cause is a timely warning even if one fears that some might be stirred by what Mathews is heard to say and then choose to misread this film’s message (the same kind of worry arose over the 1998 feature American History X which also set out to expose white supremacists).
If The Order ultimately leaves one with the impression of being an admirably made work but less than a masterpiece, that is largely due to being able to compare it with Nitram. In that film Kurzel totally avoided glamorising the killer portrayed in it yet created a work of such depth that it rendered him not only horrifying but pitiful. In The Order the portrait of Bob Matthews is persuasive but, just as the writing creates a convincing portrait of Terry Husk without finding the depth that might have made us feel deeply for him, the screenplay similarly keeps us distanced from Mathews. Nevertheless, it does enable Hoult to show the feelings of Bob Mathews as a father thus preventing him from being seen with no redeeming features whatsoever. Ultimately, timely as it is, The Order plays first and foremost as a very well realised criminal tale. In its way it is fine, but Nitram had the depth to make it haunt one's memory and that is something else altogether.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Jude Law, Nicholas Hoult, Tye Sheridan, Jurnee Smollett, Morgan Holmstrom, Odessa Young, Alison Oliver, George Tchortov, Sebastian Pigott, Philip Forest Lewitski, Matias Lucas, Victor Slezak, Marc Maron.
Dir Justin Kurzel, Pro Bryan Haas, Stuart Ford, Justin Kurzel and Jude Law, Screenplay Zack Baylin, from the book The Silent Brotherhood by Kevin Flynn and Gary Gerhardt, Ph Adam Arkapaw, Pro Des Karen Murphy, Ed Nick Fenton, Music Jed Kurzel, Costumes Rachel Dainer-Best.
AGC Studios/Chasing Epic Pictures/ Riff Raff Entertainment/Arcana Studio-Metfilm Distribution.
116 mins. USA/UK/Canada. 2024. US Rel: 6 December 2024. UK Rel: 26 December 2024. Cert. 15.
