If there is one lesson the past few decades of filmmaking have taught us, it is if you are a well-known musical artist, your life will inevitably be converted into a lengthy biographical feature – these films tend to be commercially successful and audiences are predisposed to enjoying them, solely because they use the music with which we are all familiar, evoking a sense of nostalgia that will inevitably distract from the usually shoddy, uninspired filmmaking. The most recent victim of this trend is Bob Marley, the revolutionary Jamaican artist whose short but substantial life was defined by his endeavour to fight for freedom, giving a voice to those who exist on the margins and putting an emphasis on the importance of peace around the world. Undeniably an inspirational figure whose entire existence was formed from his desire to make a difference in the world, he has understandably become a cultural icon. However, the attempt to bring his story to life on screen is not quite as successful as it ought to have been, with nearly every aspect of Bob Marley: One Love feeling like a missed opportunity. Helmed by Reinaldo Marcus Green, who started off his career strong with the fascinating Monsters and Men, but followed that up with trite biographical features Joe Bell and King Richard that proved that he is perhaps merely competent (which is attractive to studio executives who want to assert control on their company’s output, but hopelessly boring for those of us who prefer a more artistically-resonant vision going into these films), the film is about as conventional as we would expect, and nothing about it stands out as particularly memorable. It may not do a disservice to its subject, but it feels far too scattered in its vision to be effective, and the overall experience is a much less convincing one that continues a worrying trend of throwing the stories of famous musicians on the screen and hoping that no one will notice the very obvious shortcomings that abound throughout these films. This one not only lacks immunity to this issue, but it reaffirms the stranglehold this approach has on the industry and makes us wonder how much better these films would be in the hands of someone dedicated to the premise more than the profit.

One Love has many small problems that are not significant enough to derail the entire film, but that do coalesce together to become less than stellar. The reality that very few want to admit when they enter into these films is that rarely do the general public go to see these biographical accounts of their favourite artists for the story. Instead, we simply want to see their greatest hits performed, even if it essentially comes down to an actor miming over a pre-recorded track (since it is far easier to just get the rights to the music than to train an actor to sound like their subject), which is something that has been constantly refined once it was clear that the narrative doesn’t matter. Some achieve this better than others, but One Love is unfortunately not one of them. It is formed as a series of musical sequences with some plot scattered in between, to give off the illusion of a narrative structure. A film like this doesn’t care about storytelling so much as it just realizes that it needs to some some semblance of a plot, or else it would essentially just be a lengthy tribute concert. Ultimately, this means that the film is hopelessly predictable – we can figure out exactly where it is heading, and it becomes even more troubling for those who have even the most fundamental knowledge of Marley’s life and career since the oblique references and attempts to shoehorn important information into the story feels extremely blatant and tacky, and never quite works. Very rarely do we find a musical biopic that makes it extremely clear that it would much rather just recreate the music, since everyone involved knew that this is what audiences came to see – and even then, the musical sequences are not that convincing, since the energetic spark that defined Marley’s career is almost absent. The music is fantastic, but we didn’t need this film to realize this – and while it may earn Marley a few new fans, for the most part, it feels like a fool’s errand that doesn’t quite go anywhere particularly memorable or insightful, which is quite literally one of the only prerequisites for a biographical film.

One of the biggest mistakes made by this film was ending it with real footage of Marley since it confirms our suspicions that we may have had from the start – as good of an actor as he is (and he certainly has a lot of promise), Kingsley Ben-Adir was woefully miscast as the main character. Marley was a dynamic singer whose entire approach to performing was to abandon all inhibitions and become a marionette for the music and the social message he was hoping to convey. Ben-Adir conversely is far too stiff and reserved – he captures the surface-level characteristics of Marley, and he bears enough of a passing resemblance to not be too distracting, but we never feel the essence of the character. He is simply a vessel for the story, and it’s not a particularly good performance, nor one that is even interesting enough to warrant too much attention. It is Lashana Lynch as Rita Marley who has the most developed part, which makes the tendency to push her into the background whenever she’s not the focus of a scene. We can only imagine that there exists some version of this film that is more about their relationship, which may not have prioritized the music quite as much as the final product did, but which would have been far more compelling since this had the potential to be the most revealing – we all love the music, but seeing the context around which a lot of these songs were written, and how much of a role Rita played in her husband’s life would have been far more optimal and led to a more credible film. No one else registers, either as characters that play a part in the story, or as actors contributing to exploring the subject’s life, so it essentially falls on Ben-Adir to carry the film on his own, and it seems like the characterization of Marley was by far the weakest aspect of a project in which this should have been the priority. The main issue with films about these iconic musical figures is that they are so singular as presences, that it would be nearly impossible to replicate their persona, so it seems like just about anyone would have been doomed in the role, especially with such a dismissive approach to his life’s story being taken throughout the film.

However, we do often attempt to find merit in even the worst biographical dramas – we want to be able to see value since having such a film be a complete waste of time seems quite disheartening. One Love does have some good elements, which at least salvage it from being a complete disaster. Narratively, it avoids the trope of following the cradle-to-grave that is very traditional with this genre – rather than starting at the beginning of Marley’s life and following it towards the end, it takes a few years while he was at the peak of his fame, focusing almost exclusively on this as the core of the story, and having the inevitable exposition around his childhood and origins as a musician taking place in the sporadic flashbacks, which are ironically the most compelling aspects of the film, primarily because they’re the moments where it offers us insights into his roots as an artist and activist, which many may not have been entirely aware of walking into this film. Another aspect that warrants some praise is that it allows the music to speak for itself – except a couple of performances, such as “Redemption Song” (which is constantly teased throughout the film and becomes the big emotional climax towards the end, an understandable but obvious choice), Ben-Adir is not nearly as convincing as Marley, but the music remains brilliant, and there is an electrifying quality to how they are presented which makes us curious about what Green could have done had he been allowed to take a slightly more experimental approach. Marley’s music was groundbreaking and brilliant, and a different approach, such as crafting a narrative that looks into the music, would have vastly elevated this film and made it a truly engaging experience. Unfortunately, as much as we can emphasize these merits as a sign that it is not nearly as bland as it appears, One Love does struggle to maintain this promise, and it loses its lustre faster than it gained it, which is a fundamental problem of this entire genre, and something that this film does absolutely nothing to rectify, despite having the potential.

Bob Marley: One Love is the very definition of a squarely middle-of-the-road biographical feature – absolutely nothing about it is egregious or harmful to the subject’s legacy, but by the same token, we struggle to find anything particularly interesting about it, which leads to a rather uninspired affair that doesn’t do much to challenge our perspective or present a new side of this iconic figure. When your lead actor is playing one of the most iconic musicians of the 20th century, and still manages to be the least compelling aspect of your film, then there is a clear problem that necessitates a return to the drawing board to either overhaul the entire production or question whether it was even worth telling this story, especially considering virtually nothing of value is added throughout this film. This is the primal problem with this film, and it is even more frustrating considering how easy it would have been to fix it – all it required was a few more drafts of the screenplay, and perhaps shifting the perspective away from being just about Bob Marley, and instead emphasizing the relationships he formed with other characters, since this is where the most compelling moments reside, and would have given us valuable insights into his life. It never does anything we haven’t seen a dozen times before, and it descends into the same bundle of cliches we usually find in these films, and it doesn’t even attempt to hide the fact that it is simply just a series of musical performances strung together by the most flaccid, unconvincing narrative imaginable. Bob Marley deserved much better, and while it still has its moments of being quite touching, it never feels like the authentic tribute it could have been, and more just like the spinning wheel used by Hollywood to decide on the subject of their next trite musical biopic fell onto Marley. Uninspired, dull and frankly just not that interesting, One Love falters when it should have easily soared, which is unfortunately the problem with this entire genre, which has officially overstayed its welcome.