I was so excited to see Bob Marley: One Love, to see the great man again and events I lived through played out on the big screen. I started “bawlin” from the opening scene and it only got worse. The depicted moments had me longing for my more youthful days. But now I was just embarrassing my 12-year-old daughter, who just couldn’t understand why I was sobbing uncontrollably.

I can’t fully explain why this amazing movie took me on such an emotional roller coaster. There were definitely some tears of joy and laughter. “Seeco” Patterson was an exceptionally bad footballer. In my mind’s eye I could see his pigeon-toed, knock-kneed dribbling which invariably went astray, embedded in the clumsiness of the actors in the scrimmage scenes. That got mixed in with tears of sadness for those that didn’t live to see themselves portrayed, like Seeco, or “Family Man” Barrett, the last of the original Wailers who passed just before the movie’s release. There were definitely tears of pride to see David, my “nephew” in the Jamaican sense, who I’ve known almost from birth, play his dad, Junior Marvin, to perfection. Of course, there were also nostalgic tears for the great memories, imagining which starry-eyed kid was playing me in those concert crowd scenes.

But there was so much more that made this such a powerful film for me. Those fleeting moments captured onscreen would define a big part of my and our nation’s identity. I was one of thousands of youngsters in Jamaica and millions around the world, caught up in that unique time and the moment that was the Marley revolution. We were the “buffalo soldiers, the real revolutionaries”. “Cold ground might not have been our bed” every night, but we lived his music and would “get up, stand up” to make a better Jamaica, a better world.

We went to every Bob Marley concert, my first when Stevie Wonder headlined at the National Stadium. I saw him at Sunsplash, Smile Jamaica, International Year of the Rasta Child, and, of course, the famous One Love Peace Concert. We would walk by him at “Jah love” dances or see him in the crowd watching us play for Real Mona. Just the parking lot scene in front of his house where I once played football too was enough. We don’t need every microscopic detail scripted in a movie. Just give us a glimpse to start us on our journey and we’ll take it from there.

One Love delivered as best any movie on Marley probably could. Sure, I could nit-pick details because of first-hand knowledge. Like the Smile Jamaica concert scene. There were so many people on that stage, including me, that Bob barely had space to perform. I don’t particularly care about Bob’s romantic liaisons, but I appreciate Hollywood’s need to broaden the scope and portray Rita’s heroism. I would expect it, and there should be nothing less. Every good movie needs a side plot for the “suss”, just as every hero needs a heroine.

Kingsley Ben-Adir and Lashana Lynch were “oscar-esque”. I have never heard the Jamaican accent so perfectly imitated by non-Jamaicans; authentic enough to avoid indignant cringe, but with sufficient clarity to avoid the dreaded subtitles — the international kiss of death for a movie. This linguistic dexterity was critical to ensure that Bob’s portrayal and the movie maintained both realism and his global appeal. Bob would have understood that. It is no coincidence he did not sing in “patwa”. That my wife learned to speak English listening to Bob Marley music growing up in her little village of Jandhira, Brazil, illustrates how much of a gift he was to the world, not just Jamaica. Number one at the box office and US millions in sales and growing is vindication enough.

This artistic interpretation simply allowed me to spiritually revisit that tension-filled period through the Marley family’s eyes. The political violence and unbridled fear their children might “tun Rasta” because of the massive influence of this behemoth must have terrified parents in those days. I had to lie or sneak out of the house to attend Bob concerts, so many nights I was “studying at a friend’s house”. I saved lunch money to buy his music, “Jah Live” my first ever personally-owned single, amongst treasured Marley records that I hid under my bed until the coast was clear to play them. Songs of revolution by a dreadlocked, weed-smoking anarchist, who felt “like bombing a church” would have been little comfort to my mom and dad while they went to bed to the frightening sounds of gunfire. But to my friends and me, this was our years of teenage naiveté, no fears, only a quixotic view of the world, our futures and the coming marriage of revolution and peace canonised in his music. We wore our Rasta belts and tams proudly to pay homage to the cause.

My tears were uncontrollable by the time Bob stepped off that orange and yellow Air Jamaica plane in another scene – a “lovebird” ode, but yet another remnant of a nation we believed then poised to take flight, like Bob, gone. The news of his touchdown had spread like wildfire. I remember the massive lines going into the Peace concert as we lined up from midday. Our seats lay hardly used, white plastic chairs on the football field; the early morning hours when he took the stage and that electric moment with Bob, “Joshua” and “Eddie”, clasped hands aloft. Afterwards, with sunrise approaching, we walked to Phase 2 nightclub, needing to prolong that night as long as possible, feeling totally safe with a “natural mystic blowing through the air”. No movie could capture the giddiness of a sincere but oblivious generation who believed the world could be healed and we were on the way to redemption.

Perhaps the movie drew tears of guilt, of the reality that maybe we have let him down. If this movie was about all the inspiration, all the pain, all the love, and all the hope, it’s all in there. And in my tears, I could feel it in just one drop.

Christopher Dehring is CEO of Ready Communications Ltd.