Review of The Rise of the Krays

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.