On Rewatching The Krays

Catching up with Peter Medak's 'biopic' 35 years on...

I’m not a Krays obsessive. Okay, so I’ve read John Pearson’s The Profession Of Violence and its sequel The Cult Of Violence. And I watched that series of Whitechapel where Craig Parkinson plays a sorta reincarnated Ronnie and Reggie. And of course I’ve seen Brian Helgeland’s Legend with the Toms Hardy. And yes, I’ve written one or eight pieces on the brothers, but that’s about the strength of it…

Whatever interest I have in East London’s not-so-finest dates back to watching Peter Medak’s The Krays the year after it was released. As its hard to believe that 34 years have passed between that day and this, it’s stranger still to discover that, to revisit The Krays is to reacquaint yourself with a picture that doesn’t really work as a biopic but succeeds - and how! - as the grimmest of fairy tales.

First things first, the performances are uniformly excellent with Billie Whitelaw at her most compelling as the boys’ mother Violet and Tom Bell typically ‘orrible as Jack ‘The Hat’ McVitie. Spandau Ballet siblings Gary and Martin Kemp also do well to survive their stunt casting as the twins. No, they’re not the best actors and they certainly aren’t cinema’s greatest Krays. However, this isn’t really a problem since, contrary to what you might have been led to believe, Medak’s movie isn’t really about the brothers. At least, not the real ones.