Based on the true story of the infamous London gangsters known as the Kray Twins, we see Tom Hardy flexing his acting muscle as both Reggie and Ron Kray as they built their criminal empire during the 1960’s. Using many of the techniques we’ve seen in The Social Network to make Armie Hammer appear as the Winklevoss Twins, we have Tom Hardy go one better by shaping two very different twin brothers. We have Hardy playing the charming and stylish Reggie Kray, who can easily break some hearts and break some heads, but then we also have him as Ronald Kray, a physically and mentally twisted man who will really get under your skin.
The film also stars Emily Browning as Reggie’s long-suffering partner along with some other great English stalwarts such as David Thewlis, Christopher Eccleston and Paul Bettany to name a few. One of the surprising pieces of casting is Kingsman’s Taron Egerton who plays one of Ron’s gay lovers/heavy-hitters, I almost didn’t realise it was the same actor. But all other actors aside, it really is Hardy that everyone is going to be talking about.
Much like the fantastic series Orphan Black, Hardy has created two very distinct individuals within these roles. He has tweaked each character to appear as if they are completely different people; from tone of voice, delivery of lines, how they walk, how they stand, facial ticks, stares and gestures all really shape these two equally volatile people. Reggie is tall, handsome and could easily make you go all gay for Tom Hardy, but then there’s Ron who’s short, always flaring his bottom teeth, looks like an angry rabid pit bull and... seems to have no neck, and even though his character is gay, you don’t want any of that, even though it’s still Tom Hardy - that’s how good he is in this film!
Once we get past Hardy’s performance though, the film starts to feel a little hollow and empty. Sure the film has some great things going for it with regards to a solid cast, great back and forth between characters, some cool swagger here and there, but it doesn’t really feel like anything amounts to anything. There’s no development of characters outside of the Kray Twins and despite all the jokes, the violence and the cockney banter you feel like you’ve seen this story a thousand times before. Sure it’s based on a true story, but it just feels like every other gangster movie. It attempts a lot of the tropes and techniques used in other gangster films which make this feel a little tired, but even though this might sound a little contradictory, the film really could have used some Guy Ritchie editing flair.
Overall, the film has a lot of fun elements and the performance of Hardy-squared is worth the cost of the ticket alone, but despite all the swagger and cool the film tries to deliver you are not going to get anything new out of this retread of the gangster genre... Except for Hardy, that guy is the f*cking man!
Legend gets Three out of Five Stars (or Three out of Five no-necked-rabid-pit-bulls with a cockney accent)
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