DENVER — When a white supremacist gunned down outspoken Denver talk radio host Alan Berg in 1984, it inadvertently exposed a network of domestic extremists – a story told in a movie premiering this weekend. The film is based on the 1989 book “The Silent Brotherhood,” written by then-Rocky Mountain News reporters Kevin Flynn and Gary Gerhardt. The first showing of “The Order,” starring Jude Law, Nicholas Hoult and Marc Maron, is set to premiere Saturday at the Venice Film Festival.
Flynn, now a Denver City Council member, will be in attendance. “Gary passed away eight years ago, and he always said to me, ‘You know, this will make a great movie,’” Flynn said. The time from Berg’s killing on June 18, 1984, to this weekend’s movie premiere is a 35-year journey with lots of years where nothing much happened.
Flynn, who joined the Rocky in 1981 after working at a newspaper in south New Jersey, was a government affairs reporter when Berg was killed. Berg was Jewish, liberal and unafraid to take on anyone on the air – including the Ku Klux Klan and other hate groups. He had just pulled into his driveway and stepped out of his Volkswagen Beetle when a hail of bullets cut him down.
“The very next day, both newsrooms – the Rocky Mountain News and The Denver Post – put great teams of reporters on the case,” Flynn said. “It was probably one of the most notorious murders in Denver's history.” Credit: Courtesy Kevin Flynn and Nancy Gerhardt Gary Gerhard.