1. The Boat That Rocked
Production and Distribution
Rhea Sahans

2. Analyse how influential production practices and
distribution strategies were on the success of your
given case study
Production Practices:
Cast: The cast included famous British actors such as Nick Frost, Bill Nighy. As these people are
well known actors, this attracted many viewers.
Budget: The budget was just over 30 million
Themes+ Storyline: The film is set in 1966, it tells the story of a fiction pirate radio station "Radio
Rock" and its crew of DJs, who broadcast rock and pop music to the United Kingdom from a ship
anchored in the North Sea while the British government endeavors to shut them down.
Quality of script: In regards to script, many reviews described it as quite confusing which made it
muddled for the audience. This was partly responsible for the lack of success as the film only
received a small profit overall.
Director: The film was directed by Richard Curtis who has directed traditional romantic comedies
such as About Time, Love Actually and Four Weddings and a funeral. These films have generally
done quite well at the box office, which contrast to The Boat That Rocked.

3. Distribution Strategies

The Distributor: Working Title

The main target audience for this film are a British audience due to the fact that the majority of the actors
in this film are of a British origin.

Marketed In Britain as it was exhibited to attract the UK audience in may ways, by making it possible for it
to viewed in most format, cinema, dvd/Blu-ray, TV (sky), HD (sky) and online (sky).In terms of digital
marketing methods, the film used Spotify to create playlists for each of the 9 DJs featured in the film. They
did not have a viral campaign due to the older target market that they desired. This is because most viral
markets are used by younger audiences. They had a teaser trailer.

They also did not utilize social media to its full potential. Although the film had 60,000+ fans on Facebook,
the page was non interactive, not giving fans the options to post photos and videos.

Power of the studio: Working Titles is a very successful in making British films, so this would be an
advantage for the film.

4. Conclusion
 Overall, both aspects of production and distribution were highly
influential on the success of The Boat That Rocked. The
production was conducted quite poorly due to the bad quality of
script and the excessive length of the film, which had to be cut
down once the film was shown. Due to the lack of success, the film
also had to be renamed to Pirate Radio, as they thought that this
would increase sales.
 In terms of distribution, whilst the company was well established,
the minimal marketing let them down as they did not communicate
or interact with fans, which was a large disadvantage to them.