Marley - B+

Rated PG-13, 144 minutes

Music the best thing about the fascinating doc "Marley"

"Marley" is a fascinating, overlong but definitive portrait of reggae music legend Bob Marley, it's filled with many interviews, photographs and some electrifying concert footage you're likely not to get anywhere else. Exhaustive and detailed, it trails the talented Marley's personal life and career from birth in Jamaica to the time of his untimely death in 1981 from cancer. From Academy Award-winning documentary director Kevin Macdonald ("One Day in September," "The Last King of Scotland"), and while it's certainly ambitious, unsurprisingly the best thing about the film is the load of Marley music that peppers the film. From the influences on Marley's music to how Marley himself influenced music, it's a fascinating look at a strikingly handsome, charismatic individual whose main goal was to make good music. You see many, many interviews with Marley's family, bandmates and friends along with Marley himself in archival footage, though the most revealing comes in the magnetic concert footage that is the film's chief highlight. Macdonald's film, at an overlong 144 minutes, is a little redundant at times but it will certainly please Marley's fanbase. Though the Oscars for 2012 are still far away, "Marley" is one of the year's best documentaries and should easily be in the running for the Oscar for Best Documentary.