Jude Law on the hunt for white racists in Venice film

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Jude Law's latest film at the Venice Film Festival tells the true story of white supremacists planning a race war. It “needs to be made now,” its star said on Saturday.

In Australian director Justin Kurzel's “The Order,” the British actor plays a gruff FBI agent in the Pacific Northwest who is confronted with a splinter group of the Aryan Nations that is building a militia to wage war against the American government.

“Sadly, I think the relevance speaks for itself,” Law told reporters before the film's premiere on Saturday.

“It also felt like a work that needed to be done now. It's always interesting to look back, but it's also interesting to find a piece from the past that has some connection to the present,” the actor said.

The film – one of 21 films competing for the Golden Lion as the main prize at the prestigious festival – is based on the real-life group of the same name, which was active in Washington and Idaho from 1983 to 1984 under its leader Robert Mathews.

“What amazed me was that it was a story I had never heard of before,” admitted Law, who is known for a number of leading roles, including “The Young Pope” and “The Talented Mr. Ripley.”

The threat from violent right-wing extremist groups is at the forefront this year following the summer of xenophobic violence and unrest in the UK – the worst since 2011.

There are also concerns that there could be a repeat of the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol – 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 offers the filmmakers an opportunity to “have a conversation with today's politics” because the film is about “an ideology that is incredibly dangerous and can quickly spread seeds,” said director Kurzel.

Kurzel, whose most recent film “Nitram” won the Best Actor award for actor Caleb Landry Jones at Cannes in 2021, called his latest film “a manhunt into the depths of that hatred, a premonition of a divided America, a warning shot of what was and what might come.”

This hatred becomes clear right at the beginning of the film, when the host of a radio talk show in Denver insults a caller who provokes him because of his Jewish background.

“You are too incapable to cope in the world, so you try to spoil other people's enjoyment,” says host Alan Berg, who later becomes a victim of the Order as part of his quest for racial purity.

Meanwhile, the group robbed banks and printed counterfeit money to build an army against the state.

FBI agent Terry Husk (Law) makes a connection between the “White Power” leaflets posted around the city and the robberies and armored car robberies and realizes that he is dealing with a dangerous splinter group whose young, charismatic leader is Butler, played by Nicholas Hoult.

With young deputy sheriff Jamie Bowen (Tye Sheridan) at his side, Husk begins tracking down the elusive leader, who is targeting far more serious crimes, from attacks on government institutions to assassinations.

“What shocked me, and I think all of us here, were the many comparisons. And I think so many things in the film were the seeds and the nucleus for today and for many of the challenges we face,” Kurzel said of his latest film.

“I think we live in a time now, reflected in the film, where there is division and a lot of conversation about the future and ideologies,” he said.

The order's leader, Mathews, who died in a fire following an altercation with police officers in December 1984, had the special ability to “speak to the disenfranchised, to those who feel invisible, who are not being listened to,” Kurzel said.

“That voice… can exploit that vulnerability in a very dangerous way. I think that's a timeless thing.”