Admittedly ignorant on the topic, I found the film interesting as a historical piece. Being amateur boxers allowed them to "one punch" anyone who got in the way. Their idea was to strike first and strike hard. Of the twins Ronnie(Simon Cotton) was menatlly unstable and was difficult to keep in check by his brother Reggie (Kevin Leslie). They controlled the East end and expanded into the West side once gambling became legal. The film showed their violence, gang wars and influence over politicians. I am eager to see the next installment.

The acting was a bit stiff for most of the characters who were sane, but the film was still enjoyable.

Guide: F-bomb. Brief nudity.

Tom Hardy plays Reggie and Ronnie Kray ? Hey let's make a tie in movie and release it straight to DVD . Don't worry about developing it because the other film will market this one so it's just a case of releasing our film first

That's the impression I got and THE RISE OF THE KRAYS is painfully under-developed . As the other commentators have pointed out the titular characters are played by actors who bare little resemblance to the twins . Worse than that they're not good actors either . Simon Cotton is fairly dreadful as Ronnie and resembles a not very good actor playing an East End gangster . I suppose I should be charitable and say the cast and the rest of the production team were probably under heavy pressure with deadlines but even so the poor production values are a constant distraction

I can understand what director Zackary Adler tries to do with some scenes and that is to express in a cinematic style the mental illness Ronnie Kray suffers from , but considering the subject matter is an expressionistic film featuring violent gangsters really the place for a study of schizophrenia ? Probably not . Again to be charitable at least the production team don't come out with the old clichés of "Any old ladies getting mugged and he twins wanted to know about it . They stuck to their own , we were safe in those days etc etc" . The Krays are portrayed as unpleasant characters but this is also an unpleasant badly film too

Of the several Kray movies I've watched lately, this is the shallowest. The mother-love angle's barely there & they never so much as hint at Ronnie's homosexuality. Simon Cotton, the actor who plays Ronnie, was damn good tho. Clearly he'd been studying James Fox's Chas (Performance, 1970) — which is probably why I liked him so much — that same understated simmering violence & even a lot of the facial expressions Fox used so effectively. Not to say he copied Fox; I prefer to think it an homage to one of the best cinematic gangsters ever.