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Movies Ashdoc's Movie Review---Legend

ashdoc

Movie Critic
SPNer
Jul 19, 2011
391
219
49
This is gangster story , but told from the point of view of a woman . She is the wife of a gangster , and he is the leading actor of the story . Her husband ( Reggie Kray ) and his twin brother (Ronnie Kray ) hold the underworld of London to thrall in the 1960s , dream of building an illegal empire with them as overlords , and nearly succeed....

Ronnie Kray is a paranoid schizophrenic , and it is only his brother's strong arming that forces the mental institution psychiatrist to declare him fully sane . Yes , Reggie Kray is devoted to his brother and their mother insists on them sticking together through thick and thin---for as the old saying goes , blood is thicker than water....

So Reggie does not bat an eyelid even though Ronnie declares himself openly to be a homosexual and keeps goodlooking boyfriends , and indulges in psychopathic violence that sometimes spirals out of control . The two do come to savage blows when Reggie returns from one of his prison stints to find that Ronnie has driven all the customers away from his much cherished nightclub due to his abnormal behaviour , but has to patch up with him anyway...family is family after all....

What is the woman's role in all this---she has to wait long periods as her husband is in prison again and again , she has to face her mother's disapproval for marrying a gangster , she has to see violence committed in front of her , and she has to face domestic abuse at her husband's hands---which finally drives her down the bend .

The first half of the film has a self mocking style even though the brothers combine to carry out numerous acts of murder , butchery , beatings , knifings , intimidation and sheer bloodlust . But things turn more serious in the second half . The violence of course continues full scale , but because the story is from the wife's point of view it shows the personal life of the twins also . And the violence drives the personal life down the bend too....

So do the twin brothers achieve their dream of lording over London as it's crime kingpins ?? Or does Scotland yard get them ? How does Frances ( wife of Reggie ) cope with all this ?? All this is well worth a watch....

Tom Hardy plays the double role of the Kray brothers , and does so with aplomb....Emily Browning plays Frances , and does a decent job of it . The film is mainly based on the performances of the actors and the shootouts and the killings and the bloodfest that we get to see ; no great music or photography or special effects are necessary....

It would be worth spending your money to watch this film and learn that old lesson all over again---that crime does not pay....

Verdict---Good enough .
Three stars .
 

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