Fooled.

Rating: 7/10 (20 September 2016)

I sat through the entire film without realizing that Tom Hardy was playing the roles of both brothers -- crooked but handsome Reggie Krey and brutal and deformed Ron Krey, both of whom made headlines in England for their thieving ways.
It's well acted -- on everyone's part, including Emily Browning as the tiny girl friend of handsome Reggie, who is thrown out of her parents' home for hanging around with gangsters.
The Kreys build up their criminal empire, we're meant to understand, although the film is nowhere near as didactic as Martin Scorcese's movies about gangsters. The methods by which the brothers and their gang acquire their ill-gotten goods is more referred to than displayed.
I have to hand it to Tom Hardy though. Reggie is a familiar character in films, the villainous hood who loves a good woman. But Ron is some kind of hulking mutant with a mouth like a limpet, so ugly that if his face were a building it would be condemned. When that repugnant face is bashed in during a fist fight, he stumbles to his feet and wanders around, dripping blood, emitting feral howls. The performance is startling.