as Snoop Lion — has a family and speaks longingly of a life and values beyond the Los Angeles gang milieu that spawned his success. But his longtime appetite for marijuana persists, so he heads to Jamaica for a monthlong spiritual pilgrimage of sorts, documented in this competent film from Andy Capper.
In Kingston, Snoop records a reggae-flavored album, “Reincarnated,” with the producer Diplo; meets Bob Marley’s son Damian and the young singer Cutty Corn; and has an audience with the reggae elder statesman Bunny Wailer, 65, who blesses Snoop’s new name. Snoop joins Rastafarians to sample the yield at a secret pot farm, and he visits Trench Town, the neighborhood that nurtured Bob Marley and his band mate Peter Tosh, where impoverished citizens greet him with the hoopla befitting a celebrity trailed by a movie camera.
Snoop, now 41, recalls his upbringing in Long Beach, Calif.; the death of his friend Nate Dogg in 2011; his gang activity; his collaborations with Dr. Dre; and, poignantly, the murder of his friend and Death Row Records label mate Tupac Shakur in 1996. Less intriguing are soporific pronouncements from Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam on Snoop’s early life of sin. Snoop has certainly tempered his worldview, but enlightenment isn’t as evident here as much as a woozy weariness, perhaps a long-term byproduct of being very, very stoned.
“Reincarnated” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian) for strong language and, of course, ubiquitous pot smoke.
