A former associate of the Krays, Freddie Foreman, told The Sun that while watching Hardy on screen was "uncanny" and like "seeing the twins reincarnated", the film gets the relationship between Reggie and his wife, Frances Shea, totally wrong.
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.
Behind the Legend: how accurate is Tom Hardy's Krays drama? Read more More murder Legend's depiction of the murder of Jack McVitie is even more questionable – changed to fit with its inaccurate contentions, first, that Reg was sane, and second, that Ron and Reg fell out permanently over Frances.
I have studied the history of the Kray's for about 20 years, and this movie is the most accurate yet, right down to the smallest details, so well put together, I think even the Twins themselves would have been impressed!
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.
The Kray Twins "Legend" Starring Tom Hardy | Reviewed by Former Mafia Capo Michael Franzese
Did Ronnie and Reggie sleep together?
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.
Reggie refused to leave her alone, and by 1967, the reconciled as a couple but not yet living together. Reggie Kray abused Frances physically and emotionally. Reggie Kray's brother Ronnie was homosexual; even Reggie was claimed to be bisexual. After their death, documents revealed that they had an incest relationship.
The Krays in 1990. The Rise of the Krays which went straight to DVD in 2015. And Legend in 2015. Micky Fawcett has seen all three films, worked with the Krays and has written arguably the most factually accurate version of their story: Krayzy Days.
For Michael became an internationally renowned pastry chef, whilst the young Ronnie Hart chose to join the Firm. Hart later turned Queen's evidence, which ultimately led to the Krays' conviction at the Old Bailey in 1969 at the most expensive trial in legal history at that time.
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.
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.
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.
Also, most of the film was focused on the family. True, the Kray brothers were mummy's boys, but we got the point in the first ten minutes. The film sticks with this and does not paint a portrait of the terror they created and an authentic picture of British gangland.
Ronnie and Reggie Kray were twins born in Hoxton, East London, on October 23rd 1933 who became the most feared gangsters in the city during the 1950's and 1960's. They became involved in protection rackets, armed robberies, arson, assaults, and two murders in front of witnesses.
Windsor wasn't the only famous person who the twins counted as acquaintances. Amongst the celebrities they knew were actors George Raft, Judy Garland, Diana Dors, Liza Minelli and Jayne Mansfield, and singers Frank Sinatra, Shirley Bassey, Cliff Richard, Danny La Rue as well as comedian Peter Sellers.
Jack McVitie (19 April 1932 – 29 October 1967), best known as Jack the Hat, was an English criminal from London during the 1950s and 1960s. He is posthumously famous for triggering the imprisonment and downfall of the Kray twins.
According to John Pearson, Reg's intimidation of Frances was psychological: he talked about killing her, her brother and her parents and brandished his gun. Knowing she was afraid of the sight of blood, he cut his own hand and dripped blood all over her as she slept.
Reggie was strong and very technical. He was considered a skilled boxer. On the other hand Ronnie was nothing but Brute Force and mental illness. Ronnie was considered too savage, he didn't box for sport, he was out for blood.
Moody was an enforcer for the Richardsons and did freelance "work" for the Krays. He was considered by many of his peers to be "the hardest man in London". In the 1970s, he joined a team of criminals to form the Chainsaw Gang who went on to become that decade's most successful group of armed robbers.
The twins had been both amateur and professional boxers, had two disjointed careers and then a lifetime of boxing hype, invention, total lies and some neglected truths. In 1946 they fought each other in the Hackney Schools championships and Ronnie beat Reggie.
Meeting Reggie ultimately led to Frances' untimely death, at the age of only 23, when an inquest concluded she had committed suicide. A heartbroken Reggie reportedly spent £2,000 on her funeral (the equivalent of £30,000 today) and afterwards descended into a spiral of depression and excessive drinking.
While Reg was in prison, he married Roberta Jones, who was helping to publicise a film she was making about Ronnie two years after his death. Following his terminal bladder cancer diagnosis, Reggie was freed from prison on compassionate grounds by Home Secretary Jack Straw in August 2000.
