The Order

This one has some extra poignancy, since the climax of the film happened about 15 miles away from The Clyde, just north of Freeland. Englishmen Nicholas Hoult and Jude Law show their mastery of American accents as the white supremacist Bob Mathews and Terry Husk, the FBI Agent on his trail. While Mathews and his followers are counterfeiting money, robbing banks, buying firearms, recruiting, and blowing up adult movie theaters, the feds are drawing every closer, culminating in a fiery standoff at Mathews’s cabin. It’s a tense, sharp film that touches on some of Whidbey Island’s fraught history with extremism, although most of the movie sees the villains working their way across the Pacific Northwest, including Idaho, Spokane, and the Seattle area. It currently has an 89% score on both the Tomatometer and the Popcornmeter.

““The Order” is an enormously effective thriller, and yes, a timely reminder that there has never been a time in this land when darkness and hate didn’t thrive, and in numbers.” -Richard Roeper, Chicago Sun-Times
“The potent image-making and performative ferocity turns what could have been a crime thriller into a near-metaphysical showdown.” -Joshua Rothkopf, Los Angeles Times
“A chilling dive into 1980s domestic terrorism, masterfully crafted by Justin Kurzel.” -Rex Reed, Observer
“Justin Kurzel’s The Order is an absorbing, beautifully shot, impressively acted crime thriller of the kind we don’t see much on our theater screens anymore.” -Bilge Ebiri, New York Magazine, Vulture
“The Order illuminates the pipeline from economic insecurity and racial anxiety into outright white nationalism without casting a sympathetic eye toward the eponymous group’s tenets.” -Marshall Shaffer, Slant Magazine
“As antagonists, Law and Hoult are powerful yet restrained in committed performances that drive towards an inevitable combustible climax.” -Thelma Adams, AARP Movies for Grownups
“Director Justin Kurzel delivers another warning in the form of a timely American crime story.” -Jen Yamato, Washington Post
“A chilling slice of historical memory in the ways it studies one of the earliest iterations of the version of white nationalism currently insinuating itself into American politics — and its haunting understanding of the insidious creep of such beliefs.” -Maureen Lee Linker, Entertainment Weekly
“It’s a true-crime thriller, and a truly tense, expertly handled one at that” -David Fear, Rolling Stone
“Director Justin Kurzel keeps the action taut and lean, letting the story unfold on the faces of his leading men as they slowly move toward their final confrontation.” -Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times
“At once a supremely intelligent docudrama about the rise of the white-supremacist movement and a riveting crime story.” -Owen Gleiberman, Variety
“It’s a riveting thriller, a wakeup call and a disturbing reminder of how history so sadly repeats itself.” -Randy Myers, San Jose Mercury News

The Order will come to The Clyde for three special shows starting Tuesday, January 7 and playing at 7:30 on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.