The Boat That Rocked : How has the film been exhibited and distributed to reach and attract a UK audience?

The Boat That Rocked was distributed by United international pictures, a company well known for distributing films to a world-wide audience, therefore the boat that rocked was exhibited differently for the North American to British release to gain maximum reach.  In Britain it was exhibited to attract the UK audience in may ways, by manying it possible for it to viewed in most formats (multiplatform release), cinema, dvd/bluray, TV (sky), HD (sky) and online (sky).

The Boat that Rocked, I believe, has a large British target audience, older people reliving the 60’s (when it was set), to teenagers and young adults as it is humorous and contains some actors recognizable from other films targeted to them (st trinians-Gemma Arteton). So by UIP releasing it in the April half term in Britain to 400 hundred cinemas, it allowed all British audiences to be able to see it, teenagers were no longer at school (half term) and adults could go anyway- allowing the event to be shared individually, in a family or with friends.

 However it had to compete with 3 big budget blockbusters, which would appeal more greatly to the family market- a big market especially in half terms, and hence its fail in this time period.


Some titles, as with TBTR, may do better relatively in the home entertainment sector then cinemas, so the distributors had to focus hard on this to comprehend its bad cinema sales. They did this by making it easy to be viewed from home, also fun and interactive and pin pointed the releases of things such as DVD carefully, this is multiplatform release.

By releasing the DVD in Britain in September, this played a huge advantage to DVD sales, as in the colder months less people wanted to go out, more wanted to stay at home and rent/buy/watch films, so this was a popular choice, also as it’s a comedy it lightened peoples moods in the depressing darker colder months- so was a popular choice.

The music week awards held in the London Hilton was held on the same day as the Sky movies premier of the Boat That rocked, linking the theme of the film to wider events in the country (music). Allowing people to have music on their minds, so when flicking through channels and see the premier they may stop and watch.

The DVD’s and Blu ray discs come with additional content, such as deleted scenes and directors commentary, which would appeal to the older British generation who lived through it, as they could find out more about what actually happened through the directors commentary etc. This would also appeal to big fans of the film, as they will be seeing something they have yet to see from the film (deleted scenes).

New media technologies and hardware proliferation hindered the DVD sales and overseas sales of the film. Online download/uploading and streaming allowed some of the first people to buy it on DVD to post it up online, meaning that many people who want to see the film no longer have the need to pay for it and this collapses many chances of revenue..

Some issues raised by the UIP (an international company) distributing the film were that they felt the film would not appeal to the American market, which put its release date in the US back 7 months while they changed it, this meant people had time between the English release to illegally film it and post it online- where everyone internationally can reach it, and no longer feel the need to go and pay to view it.


As UIP is a major company, it is them who deal with the exhibitors who then go and prioritise Hollywood films over others, this is bad for TBTR as its release strategy would not have been so complex and this could have affected sales and hindered the attraction of the UK audience to focus more on the American audience.

Sky also have the option of viewing the film in HD, so increasing the asthetics of it, and making the viewing more enjoyable from home, encouraging more people to watch it. Also HD TV’s are becoming more popular in the UK, and as it can be viewed in HD it will be a more popular choice if wanting to watch a film  and it being the only option on the HD channel at that time.

Sky’s website is a good example of technological convergence, as you can view pictures on it, videos, reviews, post comments, look up television times all based on the Boat that Rocked, making the exhibition and distribution of the film easier for the UIP and more convenient to view for the consumer- they can get more engrossed into it and watch it from home or via laptop on a journey etc.