To the figure of Bob Marley It was reached, after his early death, at the age of 36, through several good documentaries. Framed in the wave of biopics of musicians (from Freddie Mercury to Elton John and Elvis Presley) Bob Marley: The legend It distances itself from the other three for several reasons.
One is the solemnity with which it is told. OK, it’s an official biography, because in addition to Brad Pitt as producer, his son Ziggy and his widow Rita are also behind the project. Being an authorized biography, what happens with official films happens: the good side is shown, sins are hidden and if there is an interpreter appropriate to the character, so much the better.
Reinaldo Marcus Green had done another much better biography, King Richard: A winning family, the film for which Will Smith won the Oscar. Either that film was a mirage, or Bob Marley’s film is a misstep by the director.
There is nothing to complain about Kingsley Ben-Adir as Marley: he moves, jumps and dances on stage with astonishing familiarity with the musician. We don’t know if he sings, because the versions seem sung by the reggae superstar, and the actor, who had already been Malcolm One night in Miamiand Barack Obama in a miniseries, is neither bad nor out of tune, whether he sings or not.
The problem is that the script reduces everything to a short period of time, from 1976 to 1978, but it doesn’t know how to squeeze juice out of the story. Thus, the preparatory rehearsals for the recording of Exodusthat the magazine Time considered the best album of the 20th century, they don’t add up to much, and the meetings with managers and music businessmen, even less. And the Jamaican’s few self-questions never leave him offside.
There is a lot of blah blah blah, a lot of speech and clichés. Luckily there is the music -except when the story is intended to be told with the lyrics of the songs…-.
Marley lived in turbulent Jamaica, which in 1976 faced political parties and almost led to a civil war. While this was happening, Marley was planning a peace concert, Smile Jamaica. And the member of the Rastafari movement suffered an attack that almost cost him his life.
Rita and Bob. She sheltered several of the musician’s extramarital children.For those who do not know or are not very familiar with “El Capi”, the question posed to the protagonist may seem strange (“Is it true that he smokes half a kilo of weed a day?”). Marley and the Wailers, his band at the time, smoked cigarettes or pipes, but in the film everything happens in the background, it has no implications for what will happen.
“What is reggae?”
There are the tours through European countries, and many bombastic phrases, such as “What is reggae?”, he is asked in Paris. “It is the music of the people, the conscience of the people uniting”). Uninterested in money, he will say that for the tour of Africa “as long as we have a hotel, good sound and they pay the musicians”, he has enough and more than enough.
Kingsley Ben-Adir as Marley: He had been Malcolm X in “One Night in Miami” and Barack Obama in a miniseries.Of course, Don Taylor, the manager, will take a beating from Bob when he finds out that he was overcharging the tour promoter and keeping it for himself.
Paraphrasing one of Marley’s themes, the one who says that there is no need to worry, that everything is going to be fine… Well, in this biopic, not everything is fine.
“Bob Marley, the legend”
Musical biography. United States, 2024. Original title: “Bob Marley: One Love”. 104’, SAM 13. Of: Reinaldo Marcus Green. Con: Kingsley Ben-Adir, Lashana Lynch, James Norton, Tosin Cole, Umi Myers. Salas: Hoyts Dot and Abasto, Cinemark Palermo, Cinépolis Recoleta and Houssay, Showcase Belgrano and Norcenter.