Weekly Movie Challenge – (Oscar Season Edition #5) Legend (2015)

Being that Darren and I both love watching lots and lots of movies, we decided to start a new weekly series where we challenge each other to watch a new movie that we enjoyed and feel the other one might also.

The rules are simple; it has to be a movie we have NEVER seen, (not just not reviewed)

Every Tuesday, we will both post both reviews on our sites.

Let’s hope we both can add lots of new favorites to our personal lists

Since it’s now Oscar Season, we decided to both review the same movie each week, so here are my thoughts on…..

“What is that? I come here for a PROPER shootout! What you gonna do with that rollin pin? You gonna bake me a cake? What I want is a shootout, a SHOOTOUT IS A SHOOTOUT… like a Western! ” – Ronald Kray

Number of Times Seen – 1 (18 Jan 2016)

Brief Synopsis – The story of two of London’s most notorious gangsters – The Kray Brothers who ruled the underworld during the 1960’s

My Take on it – Tom Hardy has become a breakthrough actor over the past few years and has proven time and again how talented he truly is.

There were many rumors that he would receive and Oscar nomination for this performance and that is why Darren and I chose to include this movie for our Oscar challenge.

Unfortunately, he didn’t get the nomination for this film, but rather for his role in The Revenant (2015).  Regardless, his double portrayal of both twin brothers is worthy enough for it to appear here.

His performance as both brothers is amazing and it is quite easy to forget that the same actor is playing both roles because each one has their own distinct personality and they feel like separate people.

Unfortunately, the movie itself isn’t so great.

It feels like a very average gangster movie that tries too hard to be more than it really is.

The story itself is a bit choppy and doesn’t flow well and besides the two main characters, the performances are pretty uneven.

Bottom Line – Excellent double performances by Hardy, but the story is too choppy and uneven. Loved the way that Hardy plays both characters so different and we really believe that they are two distinct and separate people.  Just another average gangster movie.

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – In the UK, Legend (2015) became the highest grossing 18-rated British film of all time, surpassing Trainspotting (1996). (From IMDB)

Rating – BAFTA Worthy

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