VENICE LIDO, Italy – Like a classic American action hit of the ‘70s, “The Order” tells of the FBI’s pursuit of murderous white supremacists and other homegrown terrorists in the Pacific Northwest.

Director Justin Kurzel’s film, which stars Jude Law, world premiered Saturday night in competition at the Venice International Film Festival.

The Order was an actual white supremacist group active in the United States in the 1980s. Although the film’s specific events happened 40 years ago, “The relevance speaks sadly for itself,” said Law, who also produced.

While Law’s Terry Husk is “a composite of a number of law enforcement who tracked down the Order leader Bob Matthews, the characterization we tried to create,” screenwriter Zach Baylin said, “was someone who felt the toll of this career and battles against these groups and the amount of sacrifice he’d experienced in pursuit of this kind of justice.”

“What was interesting to me was to play someone,” Law, 51, said, “who thought the battle was won.”

“Something in this character, having conversations with Jude about how different this was for him, really excited me,” Kurzel said. “He had a way in that was grounded.  We talked about Gene Hackman and Paul Newman, how extraordinary they were with characters who were failing — yet you adored them.”

Law’s world-weary FBI agent spent years busting the Mafia in New York. When he arrives in Idaho to re-open a shuttered FBI office, “He felt his hardest work was behind him. But his biggest task was ahead” Kurzel said. “You could say he still had a lot of work to do.”

“We wanted,” Law said, “the question to continue to be, Can he get through it?”

Law wanted a “lived in” quality. “There were a lot of discussions about facial hair” he said. “But every agent I interviewed had a moustache. So it was given I had a moustache. I guess I was hiding behind that.”

As neo-Nazis rob, murder and spread hate, Jurnee Smollett’s fierce FBI agent in charge is the film’s only Black character.

“One of the things Zach and Justin and I spoke about were these cases where I interviewed a lot of Black, Latinx former agents and how these cases were very personal. You take the work home,” said Smollett.

“And work is everything! It’s their identity in life and they’ve sacrificed to do it. Because I play a Black woman in a cis male environment, there were so many beautiful questions.

“What I loved about Justin’s approach is ‘Less is more.’ Art lets you reflect society back to you and explore the ugliness and darkness to learn from it.”

Vertical gives “The Order” a limited theatrical release Dec. 6