Legend (2015)

Director: Brian Helgeland
Writers:  Brian Helgeland, John Perason
Cast:       Tom Hardy, Emily Browning, Taron Egerton

The film tells the story of identical twin gangsters Reggie and Ronnie Kray, two of the most notorious criminals in British history, and their organised crime empire in the East End of London during the 1960s.

Tom Hardy plays the role of the identical twins in the film and when you have such a scenario playing out in a film, how well the actor is doing can be judged by whether you are not conscious about the fact that the same dude is playing the two roles. Since the two characters have very distinctive mannerisms and behavior, that aspect is handled with great ease and it is a great performance from Tom Hardy. Sadly the film ends up as a showpiece vehicle for Tom Hardy to display his acting skills with the other characters and story aspects not being interesting enough to make it a good watch. When you are making gangster films of this nature, you can either go the Goodfellas route, where you make the protagonists likeable and ones whom you can root for despite their criminal activities, or you can go the 'Black Mass' route, where they are just thoroughly unlikeable psychotics. Legend kind of treads the middle path and fails to satisfy the audience even though the film has some very good moments. You really don't care much for the wife character of Ronnie and that can be a problem when the entire film told from the perspective of their relationship. That said, the misdirection involved regarding the fate of the narrator was a cool trick and reminded me of 'Me, Earl, and the dying girl'.

Overall it is a decent watch without being any good at any point of time. Tom Hardy is always interesting in all the films that I have watched of his and this is no different and people can check it out purely because of his involvement. The film just left me feeling the same way as when I watched 'Bronson' even though this one was much more enjoyable to watch. Got to say Americans in general have got gangster films tone right down to a tee when compared with the Brits. You can also sense the same when the Krays meet their American backers. There is a sense of small-time British brashness compared to the professionalism of US mafia.

Rating: 2.5/5