Based on a true story, Legend follows the tale of Reginald "Reggie" Kray and his twin brother, Ronald "Ronnie" Kray (both portrayed by all around great guy Tom Hardy).
Ron's escape from hospital was more ingenious, Reg's marriage less violent … Tom Hardy's portrayal of both twins is admirable, unlike the film's attention to detail Reginald and Ronald Kray were twins born in 1933.
It is adapted from John Pearson's book The Profession of Violence: The Rise and Fall of the Kray Twins, which deals with their career and the relationship that bound them together, and follows their gruesome career to life imprisonment in 1969.
There's a new mob flick called Legend headed into theaters, and it stars master class actor Tom Hardy as both twin English gangsters Reggie and Ronnie Kray. The film is based on John Pearson's killer true crime book, The Profession of Violence.
Is there any truth to the King Arthur legends? - Alan Lupack
How much of Legend is true?
There is no known account of any domestic violence between them having ever occurred. The brothers' sexuality is also an object of contention. The movie shows Ronald as homosexual and Reginald as heterosexual, but the reality is likely more blurred as both brothers were actually said to be bisexual.
In the above scene we see the Kray brothers successfully fighting off seven men with the use of 2 brass knuckles and a hammer. Of course, the above scene is fictional, but it can still put into perspective the sheer power and advantage that knuckledusters give to those wielding them.
But it is less likely that you've heard about Nancy Kray. Daughter of Charlie Kray, the older brother of the twins, Nancy is one of the last surviving custodians to the more intimate world of one of the world's most renowned families.
Tom Cruise reportedly wasn't happy with the American cut of this movie and wouldn't talk about it for years because of it. He very much encouraged fans to go with the Director's Cut.
“Charlie doesn't appear in Legend at all,” I said. “Maybe they thought it would be too complicated for American audiences to have twins and a third brother.” “The Twins didn't like the first film,” Micky told me. “They hated Charlie for it all the rest of his life.”
They base the film mostly on the love story between Reggie and Frances and he really did love her and she did love him. Remember she's got this older, good-looking, immaculately dressed businessman boyfriend and she's a little 18-year-old from the east end and never been up the west to a nightclub.
And they didn't just fight other people, the twins would regularly get into vicious fights with one another! Although they operated in partnership with one another, many members of "The Firm" (the Krays' gang) attest that Reggie and Ronnie fought daily.
On 8 March 1996, Reg made an interesting decision and a curious one too. He decided to bury Charlie's son, Gary, who had just died at the age of 44, in the same grave as his wife Frances, even though there was an empty grave space available in the same large family plot.
In his biography of the twins, The Profession of Violence, Pearson claims that Ronnie Kray admitted that he and Reggie discovered they were both gay in their adolescence and would often have sex together, an activity which continued into their later life.
Despite a troubled production in which the elaborate full-size forest set was accidentally incinerated and a lengthy post-production that resulted in multiple versions of the film (with competing music scores by Jerry Goldsmith and Tangerine Dream), Legend has since been restored to Scott's original cut and embraced by ...
A few self-aware jokes would have made 'The Legend' a moderately enjoyable spoof of the vintage 'masala film'. But the film takes itself way too seriously".
Cruise spent his childhood trying to hide his dyslexia from his peers. Diagnosed at the age of seven, Cruise describes his younger self as a "functional illiterate". He could barely read in high school or through his earliest roles.
Starring a 22-year-old Tom Cruise (Top Gun Maverick) and 16-year-old Mia Sara (Ferris Bueller's Day Off), Legend is a beautifully filmed (if not particularly complex) allegory about the power of true love and the eternal struggle of good vs. evil.
Tom is the only son (among four children) of nomadic parents, Mary Lee (Pfeiffer), a special education teacher, and Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer. His parents were both from Louisville, Kentucky, and he has German, Irish, and English ancestry.
Included in the file, from the then North Eastern Criminal Record Office, are three never-before-released black and white photos of Kray believed to have been taken at Durham Jail. It describes him as being "5ft 7.5ins tall with a fresh complexion, brown eyes and dark brown hair".
More than 100 detectives raided homes and offices all over the capital in the largest operation of its kind carried out by Scotland Yard. The Kray brothers were the first to be arrested when police forced their way into their mother's council flat at Braithwaite House, Finsbury.
Ms Flannagan revealed that the Krays particularly disliked scenes that featured their mother, who was played by Billie Whitelaw, because the film showed her swearing. Ronnie told her “they hated the film” for that reason and felt that director Peter Medak had taken creative liberties with his adaptation.
Legend is a good entertaining movie about the legendary Kray brothers even though it's more about Frances, the wife of Reggie Kray, narrating her point of view regarding the whole situation. Personally I preferred The Krays from 1990 with the Kemp brothers (from Spandau Ballet) playing the twin brothers.
Despite an almost 10-year age gap, Franie and Reggie fell in love and were married, but she tragically ended her own life by taking an overdose just two years later. She suffered from mental health problems and was only 23.
