TIFF 2020 film review: 'New Order'

Ruthlessly bleak and especially unsettling given current social unrest, the violent and incendiary drama 'New Order' (screening during the 45th Toronto International Film Festival) is the one percent's worst nightmare.

In short: A high-society wedding is interrupted when violent class warfare breaks out.

"Abandon all hope, ye who enter here" is a perfectly apt advisory notice to any audience of this descent into hell. The fact that the tenuous fabric of social order is completely torn down in this movie isn't nearly as terrifying as what fills the vacuum.

First world nations are predicated on liberty and freedom. But beyond the lyrical prose found in inspiring documents like the Declaration of Independence is the unwritten code of civilization: follow the laws, and everyone lives in peace. But given enough time, other social norms become woven into the rules of civilization. And with economic disparity, economic status becomes integrated into civilization - separating the rich from everyone else. 'New Order' posits a scenario where all those civilization is completely upended, where social norms are abandoned and the rich become the targeted rather than the privileged.

The film opens on a posh event filled with vapid wedding guests, blissfully unaware of anything going on outside the confines of their estate. But just in the background, the film hints at something sinister simmering. The threat of riots, looting and protests grows - but it's always just off-screen, off the periphery - in many ways, putting the audience in the perspective of the rich wedding guests. The vagueness of what's causing the social unrest only makes the escalating threat more chilling. And when the chaos finally finds its way to the upper class compound, it strikes suddenly and decisively.

Any movie can tear down society. That's practically the point of every zombie movie ever. 'New Order' primarily follows Marianne - the bride-to-be who gets swept up in the widespread violence. A lazier movie would have just let some mob overrun Mexico City and follow Marianne through to safety. It's positively jarring to watch the mob exact righteous, gleeful, violent revenge. But this resentful lower class taking revenge on the elites is merely the beginning of this nightmare. Director Michel Franco's film offers a grim outlook for society's with ever increasing class divide - and the indignities and horrors inflicted on anyone caught in the crossfire.

Final verdict: This fundamentally upsetting film finds cruel new ways to punish the audience in this stratified world gone to hell.

Score: 4/5

'New Order' screens during TIFF 2020. This drama is not yet rated and has a running time of 88 minutes.

(Image courtesy of TIFF)