IMPERIUM, a thriller written & directed by Daniel Ragussis, came from a story by former FBI agent Michael German, who infiltrated white supremacist groups. As life-risking undercover operative ‘Nate Foster’, Daniel Radcliffe adds another win to his gallery of shrewd selections, and the low-budgeted, tautly drawn picture peers into the dark Amerikaner underside earlier visited in Betrayed and American History X. Though well-reviewed, the 2016 film came and went with little public attention. To its singular credit and our collective guilt its convincing threat message holds up with stark immediacy given that not many years after this was made the same sort of deviant, treasonous mindset infects people currently relishing their positions at the highest levels of the government.

ANGELA: “Because when it comes down to it, there really is only one essential ingredient to fascism.”  NATE: “It’s victimhood.”

Keen but unprepossessing FBI agent Foster, kidded for his nerdy appearance and loner manner, nonetheless possesses the right branch of social skills that convince experienced agent ‘Angela Zamparo’ (Toni Collette) to recruit him for a hazard-high assignment; stopping a possible bomb attack that will deploy stolen cesium-137, an isotope with radioactive reach that would bring mass casualties. Gearing up with a viable cover bio (disgruntled Iraq vet) and aggressively aggrieved punk look, Nick infiltrates a Virginia-based neo-Nazi skinhead group. He tracks their ‘brotherhood’ connections up the rat chain of radio talk show rabble rousers, Klansmen, armed militias and ideologues-next-door whose neighborly smiles mask apocalyptic intentions. Your basic all-American morons, thugs, cowards and hypocrites—who can put on a good barbecue.

Radcliffe is as adept masking his British accent as Collette is in hiding her Australian one, and the supporting lineup features solid turns from Tracy Betts as ‘Dallas Wolf’, phony mouthpiece hero of the AM pander zone (thanks, despicable bastards, for a half-century of well-paid lies) and imposing Chris Sullivan as ‘Andrew Blackwell’, cold and calm militia ‘patriot’. The portraits of these unfortunately real & present types are sketched with nuance rather than hysteria, making them all the more believable and disturbing.

Made for $15,000,000, the limited release in ’16 only brought back $349,876, then $736,745 was added from video sales. With ‘foot soldier’ support from Sam Trammell, Seth Numrich, Pawel Szajda and Burn Gorman. See it and weep, because what can’t happen already has. 109 minutes.