Legend

I was anticipating Legend for a long time, it had everything I liked, English accents, the 60's Tom Hardy, twice! and lets not forget the Gangster-themes. But then I went and saw it. And I was amazed at how good it actually was. Better than my already high expetations. But what made it good? what made it more than a gimmicy-, double-role movie.?

Well!

The story, it was great! While it felt like it dragged at some points, it made clear that it was necessary in order to make the emotional pay-off work. Telling the story of the Kray twins, the sensible and well-behaved Reginald, and the paranoid-schitzophrenic Ronald. Played by Tom Hardy and Tom Hardy respectively. The tale of the two brothers is balanced between the two, perhaps focusing more on Reggie and his wife, Frances. The first half of the film really reminded me of Lock, Stock and two smoking barrels, with its british wit, long suspensful shots, and the fpm being about 5. The second half however flips the tone on its head, not that thats a bad thing, it just comes unexpectedly, everything just gets darker from the beginning. 

The casting couldnt have been better, researching some old photographs of the real-life counterparts of the characters, they are spot on. And the acting by those dobbelgangers is perfect, feeling like real people and all delivering great performances. But about Tom Hardy, he is absolutely mindblowing in the movie. Usually with twin-movies where the same actor plays both siblings, its hard to tell apart wich is wich without context clues, thats why films like Parent Trap had the twins speak in different accents. Here though, the manorisms, look, walking style, voice, are all distinguishable, without being too different, I completely buy these two being two different people who happen to have the same face. The glasses were added to Ronnie, to make it easier for the audience, even though in real life, he didnt wear them. If Tom Hardy doesnt win the Oscar for best actor, I will be mad.

This being an adaptation of the book, The Profession of Violence: the Rise and Fall of the Kray Twins, there are a lot of inacruases, like Ronnie being gay instead of bi, Reggies second wife not even getting a mention, and the last words of some characters. All in all, Legend is worth going to see, while a bit dragging at times, you will no doubt have a good time watching it.