‘The Order’ review: FBI agent Jude Law takes on white supremacists in a tense movie based on a true story

“The Order” is a good, solid, fact-based thriller that arrives in wide release this week without much hype or self-conscious isn’t-this-topical strain. That, we don’t need. On the other hand, it is topical, though it’s set in 1983-84. History, perpetually, is our object in the rear-view mirror that’s closer than it appears.

Director Justin Kurzel hails from Australia, and this is a Canadian production with Alberta subbing, convincingly, for rural Idaho and thereabouts. Screenwriter Zach Baylin based his work on the nonfiction book “The Silent Brotherhood.”

“The Order” shapes that story as an account of how the FBI, represented here primarily by a fictional New York-to-Idaho transplant portrayed by Jude Law, took on a Pacific Northwest cadre of white supremacists known as The Order in the early 1980s. The Order’s fresh-faced leader, Robert Mathews, engineered a string of bank robberies, financing a plan to attack the U.S. Capitol and overthrow the government. Mathews’ blueprint was “The Turner Diaries,” a fancifully apocalyptic 1978 novel laying out steps toward a successful all-American insurrection.

Law’s character, Terry Husk, arrives in Idaho a man in desperate need of repair. His marriage is shaky, as is his corrosive history with alcohol. He’s anticipating a quiet, uneventful period of isolation and recovery. Then he notices a few White Power leaflets and flyers around town enticing citizens to “reclaiming your birth right.”

Concurrently, local law enforcement receives reports of a string of bank robberies in Spokane, Washington, and other cities. As Husk investigates the apparent activities of The Order nearby, the connections between the robberies and The Order’s activities tighten. Tye Sheridan plays the newest addition to the sheriff’s office, a longtime local resident who grew up with a lot of the Order’s members. At considerable personal risk, he becomes Husk’s ally in tracking down Mathews.

We know where “The Order” is going; the actors ensure our interest en route. Nicholas Hoult plays the charismatic cult leader, and he’s just right, lending a disarming air of a Boy Scout grown up and ready for a truly big adventure, working from more than one handbook to create his own toxic ideology. Jurnee Smollett could use another scene or three but she’s equally assured as Husk’s fellow FBI agent, the movie’s sounding board, skeptic and wary conscience.

Nothing the feds are up against in “The Order” feels settled, or solved, by movie’s end, and only a dishonest thriller would settle for a finale with anything like finality. Kurzel has a real knack for violence in the right doses, in the robbery and heist sequences as well as smaller, sweatier encounters. There’s a bit of a sag around the halfway point, as Baylin’s screenplay lets the audience get out ahead of the story developments. And functioning as a dramatic composite of several real-life FBI agents, Husk lacks definition.

But Law, sporting a literally weighty and arguably depressed mustache, fills in what’s missing. He’s not going for swaggering heroics here; instead he creates a surly husk of a man (whose character name is not subtle) steeling himself for whatever’s next, trying not give in to his rage. The supporting characters weave in and out of the narrative, often unpredictably. At one point, one such character, Mathews’ ideologically simpatico minister (Victor Slezak), mentions that “in 10 years, we’ll have people in Congress and the Senate.”

It’s a quick throwaway line. It’s also a telegram from America’s past to America’s future.

“The Order” — 3 stars (out of 4)

MPA rating: R (for some strong violence, and language throughout)

Running time: 2:00

How to watch: Premieres in theaters Fri. Dec. 6

Michael Phillips is a Tribune critic.