Legend (2015)
Certified: 18
Duration: 131 minutes
Directed by: Brian Helgeland
Starring: Tom Hardy, Emily Browning, Christopher Eccleston, Taron Egerton, Paul Bettany, Colin Morgan, David Thewlis, Chazz Palminteri, Aneurin Barnard, Paul Anderson, Kevin McNally
KRS Releasing Ltd

Legend sees the return of the gangster movie and shows how fast Tom Hardy has become one of the best actors at the moment.

The film is a recreation – I’m not sure how faithful – of the life of the Kray twins, whose exploits have already been brought on screen in The Krays (1990). Here, with the use of some seamless Hollywood technological wizardry, Hardy plays both Ronnie and Reggie, making for interesting viewing.

Academy Award-winner Brian Helgeland’s film does not steer away from the classic biopic structure but succeeds in giving the film a sense of glitzy, fashionable class as he recreates that 1950s and 1960s British cool that puts us straight into the period with the minimum of effort.

The story is seen through the eyes of Frances Shea (Emily Browning) who married Reggie. She is the one who provides us with the narration and the one to give the film its tone.

The film takes on two facets: one based on Frances’s life and how she was treated by Reggie and the other a depiction of how the twins build their fame and power. Thus, we are inserted in a very convincing fashion into their ascent in a glittery Soho – one that was paved in blood. The film also provides a different perspective by bringing in Christopher Ecclestone to play Leonard ‘Nipper’ Read, the police detective who is tasked to bring the twins down.

Hardy’s portrayal of the twins is superb as he brings a certain style and characterisation. On the one side, he plays Ronnie who is gay and unstable and Reggie, the smooth criminal, violent and motivational leader who is a sort of a Jesse James hero. It is thanks to Hardy’s bravura and the technical staff that the shift from one character to another is seamless.

The film is made to look like a fashion magazine, with the nightclubs looking really cool and the singers extremely sexy.

Helgeland has brought back 1950s chic in a new way and created a vision and reality for the film that may or may not have been true but, for work for the duration of the film.

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