Dreaming of a dystopia

Individual opinions might differ on several counts over Justin Kurzel's The Order, but for two points of consensus: its eerie sense of timeliness and relevance in these hate-filled, polarising times and a solid performance by an unrecognisable Jude Law.

- NAMRATA JOSHI

Law plays Terry Husk, a toughened, battle-scarred FBI agent, looking ragged, scraggy, and grizzled beyond his age. Estranged from his wife and daughters and having dealt with tough cases involving the Ku Klux Klan and the Italian-American mafia, he is hoping for a relatively comfortable and laidback stint in Idaho. But that's easier wished for than bestowed. He has to take charge of the interrogation into the alarming surge in bombings, bank robberies, armoured car loot and counterfeiting, which leads him to a white supremacist militant group called The Order that is aiming to overthrow the US government and build a White American Bastion in the Pacific Northwest.

He soon has a new adversary in the leader of the militia, the neo-Nazi, hate-mongering, antisemite Bob Mathews (Nicholas Hoult). And an ally in his deputy Jamie Brown (Tye Sheridan).