#MovieReview: Bob Marley: One Love pulls its punches [Watch]
The movie is solidly made and will get you singing along to some familiar hits, it just lacks the invention and ambition that could have made it a classic.
Bob Marley: One Love commits the cardinal biopic sin of making entertainment that is less interesting than real life.
The movie is a portrait of one of history’s most enduring public figures, Bob Marley, across a brief period of upheaval in his life between 1976-78.
Marley was a unique cultural force whose brand of marijuana smoking, easy living pacifism belied an imperfect man who dealt with struggles of his own.
Although that complexity is hinted at in One Love, the movie unfortunately carries soft edges clearly sanded down by the estate who okayed his life rights for big screen depiction.
Generally, musical biopics are either approved by the estate of the artist and include their music or are made without approval and have to skirt around using the artist’s back catalogue.
For example, the estate-approved Elvis (2022) biopic had all the music but presented a sanitised version of the man, while the unapproved Priscilla (2023) told a more nuanced version of his young wife’s life but had no Elvis needle drops.
That’s the line One Love is forced to walk and you can almost feel the edits suggested by his estate.
It’s a real pity, because Marley’s life story is certainly one that could support a film adaptation.
Directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (King Richard), the movie sees Kingsley Ben-Adir play the Rastafarian icon.
Ben-Adir’s performance is one of the best parts of One Love and sees him credibly pulling off the Jamaican patois accent that can so easily become caricature.
The always excellent Lashana Lynch is also good as Marley’s wife Rita and the performance scenes are unsurprisingly rousing for fans of the music, although some song choices are painfully obvious.
What song should play after the Marleys get into a marital argument? Well, ‘No Woman No Cry’ of course.
One Love is solidly made and will get you singing along to some familiar hits, it just lacks the invention and ambition that could have made it a classic.
Rated 13 for some Language and Violence.
2.5/5.
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