Streaming Spotlight by Cindy Summers
Bob Marley: One Love – Prime Video
Breeze rating from 1 to 4 palm trees, 4 being best.
“Bob Marley: One Love” is based on the life of reggae legend Bob Marley who rose up from the adversity of growing up in the concrete jungle of Trench Town to becoming the biggest star of Jamaica. In 1976 Jamaica was experiencing great civil unrest due to two political parties driving the country to near civil war. In an effort to help unite the people, Bob Marley (Kinsley Ben-Adir) scheduled a free peace concert called “Smile Jamaica” that was expressly intended to promote peace and unity, and absolutely excluded any political ties.
Tragically, the day before the concert Bob, his wife Rita (Lashana Lynch) and his friend and manager Don Taylor (Anthony Welsh) were shot by several men who entered their friend’s home where the band rehearsed in an effort to prevent the peace concert from happening. Bob was shot in the arm and a bullet grazed his chest, and Don was shot six times needing to be airlifted to Miami. While outside in their car, Rita was shot at almost point blank range in the head, but luckily her dreadlocks stopped the bullet from coming within an inch of her brain.
Bob decided to still do the peace concert and Rita checked herself out of the hospital to join him on stage, as she was a backup singer in the band and also committed to the show going on. Bob started off with “War” but had multiple visions of his shooter in the crowd and stopped the concert after only one song. Bob told Rita she needed to go to America with their children to stay safe, and that he needed time to deal with his trauma and headed to London with his band mates.
Marley decided his next album would need to be different to have his message reach a global audience. After a few months, Bob asked Rita to join him saying he couldn’t finish the new album without her. When she arrived in London, Rita reminded Bob not to let what happened to them affect his music. “Exodus” was inspired when Marley’s friend played the soundtrack from the movie of the same name and they immediately wrote the song impromptu with the whole band having a natural synergy in creating the song.
While in London, Bob kept up with the problems back in Jamaica ,even seeing a number of his friends arrested. Carly Barrett and Tyrone Downie came to London to ask Bob to return to Jamaica and do a unity concert, but he refused. Marley continued to work on the the music with his band creating some of his most well-known hits and released the album “Exodus” by Bob Marley and the Wailers in 1977.
Marley and the band started touring again to sold out shows throughout Europe as “Exodus” rose to 14 on the UK Singles Chart, climbed the US charts to number three with the album eventually being awarded a gold record. “Reggae music is the consciousness of the people coming together” was one way Marley described his revolutionary music to a growing world audience. Marley wanted to tour next in Africa, but his record producer had already committed the band to a U.S. tour. Bob had a toe infection that wasn’t healing, but refused to address it until the tour was over.
When Bob did eventually go to the doctor he discovered he had a rare form of skin cancer, but refused treatment and returned with Rita to Jamaica. Marley did do a unity concert in Jamaica in 1978 called the “One Love Peace Concert”, where the heads of both of Jamaica’s political parties held hands together with Marley on stage. Marley also realized his plans to perform in Africa in 1980 in Zimbabwe to commemorate the end of colonial rule before he died from his cancer in 1981 at the age of 36. Time Magazine called “Exodus” the greatest album of the 20th Century.
Runtime: 1h 50m
