21/02/2024
I ADVISE EVERYONE TO GO AND SEE THE FIRST FILM MADE ABOUT BOB MARLEY; FOR THOSE WHO ARE FANS... KEEP YOUR EXPECTATIONS LOW...
Review of the film 'Bob Marley: One Love'
I went to the cinema yesterday. It had been years since I went into a movie theatre. Although I deeply love to do so, my precarious economic conditions of the last few years have forced me to put this pleasant habit among the superfluous things and thus to shelve, each time, the desire to go back.
Not yesterday, though. I couldn't give it up. In the ultra-modern and cosy Pathè multi-screen cinema in Dakar, the official 'premiere' of One Love, the first film made about Bob Marley, was scheduled. Since the year of his death (1981) and over the following years, countless biographical documentaries have been made about the life of the Jamaican king of reggae, but never before had a proper film with actors been produced.
In reviewing the film, I want to start with my own personal assessment of the simplest and most banal questions: "Did you enjoy the film?" Yes; "Would you recommend it to others?" Yes; "Did it fulfil your expectations?" No; "Do you think it was an exhaustive reconstruction of Marley's life?" No; "Do you think it is a film that allows you to get to know Bob Marley's character in depth?" No.
Before I go into my review of the film, I must make a necessary and fundamental premise. For me, Bob Marley was a fundamental figure in my growing up. First, a youthful idol, then, a reference in adulthood. As a boy, I collected his vinyl records: whether they were the official 33 or 45s, live bootlegs or collections published in every corner of the world. Whatever book came out about Bob I tried to make it mine; and then, posters and hundreds and hundreds of photos and postcards with which I wallpapered the walls of my room; concert tapes and all the video material then available on VHS tapes. In my travels around Europe I remember ransacking shops in London, Amsterdam and Paris, all cities where there was plenty of Bob material. Then came the digital era: during my trips to New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco, I bought for myself on CD the 11 albums of the official discography produced by Island Records, as well as other live bootlegs and collections that never stopped coming out over time. Since 1999 and for the first five years of the 2000s, my passion for reggae music led me to found and play in a sound system, and consequently the search for the original 7" vinyls continued, reissued, of course, because the original pressings are now collectors' items and with unattainable prices! Until arriving, in more recent times, to the purchase of the most famous DVDs. In short, all this to show you that my connection and relative deep knowledge of the Bob Marley character is very much present in me. This strong 'closeness' of mine to the artist of the film inevitably goes to influence the critical judgement of the work realised.
An analogy immediately occurs to me with two great films made about musical artists: Oliver Stone's 1991 film about Jim Morrison (The Doors) and Bryan Singer's 2018 film about Freddie Mercury (Bohemian Rhapsody). Cinematically portraying the life of a singer, I believe, is a very difficult task, because necessarily, if one wants to make the spectator experience the emotions that only the art of a film, made of images, can convey, one will hardly be able to be faithful to the aptitude of a singer's art, which remains that of making emotions come alive through music. This inevitably means that those who love and know a particular artist deeply will find it difficult to accept the inevitable distortions of reality that are 'demands' of a film script. In a film, the protagonist, however damned he may be, is still the hero; from his figure must transpire a sort of myth, something that fascinates, involves and excites the spectator. I mentioned, not by chance, the films about the leaders of the Doors and Queen, because I remember fierce criticism, especially from those who were fans of those two wonderful rock bands. The distortion of the reality of the facts and the so-called cinematic 'gimmicks' or 'adaptations' are not well liked by those who know the life of the character in the film inside out. On the contrary, for me, who was a fan of the music of the Doors and Queen, but only knew the lives of Morrison and Mercury in broad strokes, they were two masterpieces.
The myth of the hero is made of beauty, moral and external, which gives him immortality. The Palestinian Jesus of Nazareth is the most fitting example: he, who was probably more black than white, dirty, smelly and with dreadlocks like Marley's, to be imposed as a myth on the Christian public it was agreed that he should be portrayed: white, blond, handsome and blue-eyed... that's it, There, that's how I have better rendered the idea of what is meant by 'cinematic necessity'.
In the film 'One Love', well directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green, the physical and artistic figure of Bob Marley has not been distorted but rather faithfully traces him, thanks to the skill and resemblance of the actor Kingsley Ben-Adir who, especially in vocal parts, fully resembles Marley. Nevertheless, it is undeniable that Kingsley is better looking than Bob! Just as the beautiful and very talented Lashana Lynch is considerably more attractive than Bob's real-life wife, Rita, whom she plays masterfully. And here I rise to make a point about a detail that the less erudite on Marley may miss. Rita Marley is to this day the owner of her husband's copyright and image rights, as well as the producer of the film itself. Having said that, for me, the film should not have been titled 'One Love', the title of one of Bob's most famous songs, but rather 'Bob & Rita'. At times, in fact, the plot takes on romantic overtones that make it seem like a love film and that absolutely emphasise the figure of Rita, elevating her not only as a mother-model but also as a sort of spirit guide for Bob, both in his problematic everyday life and in his spiritual one, since she too has embraced, like her husband, the Rastafarian faith. Now, I do not in any way want to assert that Rita was not a good mother to her children, nor that she was not a partner in love with her man, but it is evident that Bob, who got engaged to Rita when he was very young, after a certain period 'married' the dictates of polygamy. Officially, in fact, Bob has acknowledged 13 children: 3 conceived with Rita plus, 2 adopted and had by Rita from other relationships and, another 8, had by 8 different partners, including one, Damian, to date the most famous, by Cindy Breakspeare, model and Miss World 1976. Cindy played a fundamental role in Bob's life, having been by his side for almost all his life and especially in the last year, the most painful year of the illness that led to his death in 1981, when he was only 36 years old. In the film, this is not perceived; in some flashbacks of a young Marley, only Rita's three children (Cedella, Ziggy and Stephan) are glimpsed, while Cindy, who also officially lived in Bob's large residence in Jamaica, is glimpsed in the background in some scenes where Marley's entire crew is present, but she is never given a word throughout the film.
Another thing I absolutely disliked was the choice of flashback script. I love autobiographical films where the chronology of events is respected. In One Love, the plot focuses only on a short period of Marley's life (December 1976-April 1978): that ranging from the assassination attempt suffered at his residence, in Kingston, by Bob, Rita and manager Don Taylor in December 1976, in a scorching political climate and three days before the concert-event "Smile Jamaica", organised at the behest of Jamaican Prime Minister Michael Manley, with the aim of defusing tensions between rival political groups, and Bob's subsequent departure for London, where he would reside and release two of his most iconic records (Exodus in 1977 and Kaya in 1978) before returning to Jamaica in April 1978 for another concert that became historic (One Love Peace Concert) in which he called the two political leaders of the opposing factions, Labourist Michael Manley and Conservative Edward Seaga, on stage and, singing and dancing to the notes of Jamming, joined hands above his head in a powerful gesture of political détente and hope for peace.
This brief period in Bob's life, certainly focal and full of important events, is continually interspersed in the film with impromptu scenes referring to the period before, which, especially for the viewer unaware of Marley's history, may seem incomprehensible in the context of the plot. I don't know how many understood the scene where a young Marley, in the company of his mother, is in the United States because he wants to meet his father (an English Captain, white) who refused even to welcome him home. Seeing a white man riding away on horseback under Bob's disappointed gaze I do not think is enough to make most people understand the contextualisation of that scene.
Similarly, the flashbacks concerning the Rastafari faith, embraced at a young age by Marley, the 'apparitions' on horseback of Haile Selassie, the Negus-Emperor of Ethiopia, a central figure in the Rastafarian creed, or those referring to Marcus Garvey, a preacher proclaiming 'repatriation', i.e. the return of all African-American blacks to Mama Africa and his prophecy of 7-7-77 (Two Sevens Clash) as the day of a hypothetical Apocalypse, are, in my opinion, difficult to understand for the viewer who is totally ignorant of what Rastafarianism is.
There are, however, some very well reconstructed flashbacks: my favourite is definitely the one where the Wailing Wailers (Bob's first band name) go to their first audition at the legendary Studio One of Coxsone Dodd, one of the most famous producers on the island at the time. Their rendition of their first ska hit 'Simmer down' is fabulous (as is the image of sound engineer Lee Scratch Perry dancing his ass off!) This is the only image in which Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer, the future The Wailers who, until their disbandment in 1974, accompanied Bob Marley and were responsible for the group's huge success on the island, are clearly recognisable. Bunny in particular had grown up with Bob and could be regarded as his best friend. The fact that there is no reference to the two of them in the film seemed indelicate and disrespectful to Peter and Bunny who contributed equally to the initial musical success and to the formation of the adult Bob. But, I believe the omission from the film, even of their names, is due to a question of rights, which as mentioned, as far as all things Marley are concerned, belong to Rita. Peter and Bunny have both made solo careers out of having other impresarios managing their copyright and image rights.
The cinematography of the film is very beautiful; moreover, the wonderful geographical setting, Jamaica, I would say helped. The parts recorded in London are also very powerful and emotional.
In particular, the encounter of Marley and his crew with the British punk movement, which was at its peak in 1977, is represented in the film by an evening when they go to a concert of Joe Strummer's Clash, which results in scuffles with the police, testifying to the strong social tensions that characterised that period in England.
Another unclear passage in the film concerns the scene of Bob's attack on his manager Don Taylor, guilty of having cheated him on the organisation of some concerts to be held in Africa. The episode seems to have really happened but in a hotel in Gabon in 1980 and not during Marley's stay in London in 1978. The film shows the Marley couple as guests at a lavish London reception and during the evening Rita notices Don Taylor receiving money from an unidentified person. She then reports the incident to Bob, who goes into a rage and punches Don hard in the face. On the same evening Rita is approached by a music producer who offers her to record an album with the I-Trees, Bob's three backing singers (Marcia Griffiths, Judy Mowatt and Rita herself). Bob, overcome with jealousy, becomes angry and denies his wife's consent for such an operation; a furious argument ensues and Rita accuses Bob of no longer being the 'pure Rasta' he once was and that he is now gentrifying himself by attending English social gatherings. This scene, which in the viewer's mind once again affirms Rita's righteousness and self-righteousness, may well have actually happened but, in the context in which it is put forward, it only detracts from Bob's desire to go to 'his' Africa. The African concerts spoken of, and for which Don Taylor is said to have pocketed money, never actually took place during the period in which the film is set.
In fact, Marley only managed to land in 'his' beloved Africa in December 1978; after a brief stop in Kenya, he spent four days in Ethiopia, between Addis Ababa, where he visited several places significant to Selassie's life, and Shashamane, home to Ethiopia's largest Rasta community. During this first trip to Africa, he did not perform any concerts.
He only managed to return to the African continent twice more: the first, very controversial and criticised, was in January 1980 in Libreville, the capital of Gabon. It was here that the argument with Don Taylor probably took place and Rita was not present. Marley, while on tour in the United States in the late 1970s, had had an affair with a young student he had met at one of his concerts, Pascaline Bongo, daughter of the President of Gabon, Omar Bongo. This was a man who had become very rich from oil revenues and was known internationally as a vicious dictator who starved his people. On the occasion of one of his birthday celebrations, the despot decided to invite Bob Marley to his cohort, but it is clear that the invitation came from his daughter who wanted to keep the promise she had made to Bob when they met, that sooner or later she would take him to Africa. Omar Bongo remained in power for 42 years, from 1967 to 2009, the year of his death; he was succeeded by his son Ali, Pascaline's brother, who remained head of the Gabonese nation until August 2023, when he was deposed by a military coup.
Marley held two soirees, on 4 and 6 January in front of a lavish audience that bore little resemblance to his ideals as a revolutionary and defender of the oppressed. Of this episode, as of the aforementioned previous trip, there is no mention in the film, although the reference to Africa is often emphasised during several dialogues.
Four months later, Marley returned to African soil for the last time in his life, this time for a noble and prestigious occasion. It happened on 18 April 1980, on the occasion of Zimbabwe's Independence Day, a country for which Bob had written a song, simply titled Zimbabwe, on his 1979 album dedicated to Africa, 'Survival'. It is the album with which I personally got to know Bob Marley and which I carry in my heart and soul, still considering it his best ever. The one held in the stadium of Harare, capital of Zimbabwe, in front of 100,000 people was an epic concert, sadly saddened by continuous incidents and charges by the local police. The then Head of Government was Robert Mugabe, who would later become President of the country in 1987, establishing a terrible and bloody dictatorship that lasted 30 years, until 2017, when he was deposed by a non-violent coup d'état. Mugabe did not want Marley to perform on Independence Day as he considered him to be a 'subversive, drunkard and always high on ma*****na', as he told a local radio station, and would have wanted Cliff Richard, the world-renowned British rocker and singer, to play. The police brutality on the day of the concert and the ostracism towards Marley and his entourage is said to have been at the behest of Mugabe himself, who was enraged at not being able to get the Parliamentary Assembly to agree to let Cliff Richard play. This episode, of extreme importance to Marley who had finally gained exemplary recognition in 'his' Africa, is simply mentioned at the end of the film in two lines before the credits.
A final critical note that I would like to raise relates somewhat to what has been said about the lack of importance given in the film to the relationship that bound Marley to Africa and what really happened about that relationship. I refer to the somewhat murkier aspects of the man-Marley that are not brought out so as not to 'soil' the figure of the hero. In the early period of his musical career Bob grew up in a violent Kingston of gang rivalries and bullying. He is known to have often turned up with his acolytes at local radio stations to threaten deejays if they did not 'push' his tunes. Moreover, the sale of ma*****na, present everywhere on the island, was undeniably a lucrative means of livelihood and I don't think the Wailers crew was exempt. To understand what I mean, one need only think of some biographical films about some of the greatest American rappers ever: 'Notorious B.I.G.', 'All eyez on me' about Tupac Shakur and '8 Mile' about Eminem. In these three highly successful films, the artists' relationship with drugs is not sugarcoated, if not removed from the narrative. In 'One Love', on the other hand, apart from seeing them smoking pot all the time (it would have been dramatic if this were not the case!) there is no mention of the relationship with cannabis and 'its' world. Furthermore, even the importance for the 'spiritual' aspect that smoking w**d represents for Rastafarians is not explained in any way.
All in all, despite my criticism dictated, as I explained at the beginning, by being a Bob Marley fan and thus being somewhat disappointed by the expectations I had set for myself, I still think it is a good film and worth going to see. If only to keep the myth of the best-known singer on earth alive. Indeed, Bob Marley and his music, as well as his messages of peace and equality, have reached every corner of the planet as no one else has managed to do.
I close with a curiosity about the casting: the beautiful backing singer of the I-Trees, Judy Mowatt, is played by Sevana, one of the most popular Jamaican reggae artists today, while the role of the legendary bass player of the Wailers, Aston 'Family Man' Barrett, who sadly passed away on 3 February this year, is played by his son Aston Barrett Jr.
ONE LOVE
® COPYRIGHT RESERVED - Massimo Morici
