The dormant 2024 box office is being semi-revived this weekend with Reinaldo Marcus Green’s “Bob Marley: One Love” which is set to have a $46 million 6-day opening weekend. Not too shabby for a film that was pulled from the late-year Oscar release calendar.
While the reviews were not good — 43% on Rotten Tomatoes and 43 on Metacritic — ‘Bob Marley’ seems to be winning over crowds. It garnered a much-needed A on CinemaScore, 93% user rating on RT and 6.5 on IMDB. The divide between audience and critic is again manifesting itself.
I watched the film last Tuesday and it’s definitely a competent enough effort — very much in line, in terms of quality, with 2018’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.” Take it or leave it. Very cookie cutter in the way it presents the life of the famous reggae singer. The lead performance (Kingsley Ben-Adir) is strong. The musical performances are the highlight.
If you want a better account of the reggae singer’s life then a good start would probably be Kevin Macdonald’s definitive 2012 doc, “Marley.” It’s currently streaming on Netflix and well worth a look. That’s what also worries me about the upcoming Amy Winehouse biopic, “Back in Black” — there’s already an incredible doc (“Amy”) about the late singer, and I doubt the the film will be as thoroughly in-depth.