Legend
Starring Tom Hardy, Emily Browning
Directed by Brian Helgeland
As if Tom Hardy’s year hasn’t been varied enough, the actor stretches his versatility once more to play not one, but two roles in the gangster biopic Legend. The thespian portrays the infamous real life Kray brothers, identical twins who ruled London’s criminal underworld in the 1960s.
Reggie is the bespectacled, mild-mannered sibling, while Ronnie is the hulking, openly-gay psychotic. To watch Hardy intricately tackle each character is fascinating; equally intriguing is how the film’s creators were able to mesh an actor playing two roles so seamlessly on a technical level.
Still, as impressive as its lead star is, Legend suffers from a number of problems that result in a muddled affair. The opening scene consists of a shot of the Kray brothers sitting inside a car as the voice of Emily Browning (who eventually becomes the romantic interest for Reggie) provides some awful exposition that spells out exactly who these guys were. Throwing subtlety aside so quickly hurts the tone of the movie and it has trouble recovering as the story unfolds.
Helgeland demonstrates some keen direction and captures several breathtaking fight sequences but he comes up short in the writing department as Legend feels, at times, like a knock-off Scorsese TV movie (Carter Burwell’s unusually bland score never fits the mood either).
The decision to focus more on the film’s romantic sub-plot and less on sibling rivalry also makes for tedious plotting. Hardy offers up moments of brilliance here, it’s too bad they’re not in a better film.
