The Radio Rock boat from The Boat That Rocked

The ship of shame and the boat of love – one place, two descriptions. The former comes from British government minister Dormandy (played by Kenneth Branagh), a fusty establishment figure set on shutting down the rock’n’roll excesses of pirate radio station Radio Rock, illegally transmitting from a ship on the North Sea. The latter comes from side-burned lothario Dave (Simon Pegg’s comedy cohort, Nick Frost), one of the DJs from Radio Rock flouting the law and living the life out on the high seas.

The Boat That Rocked marks comedy writer Richard Curtis’s (Notting Hill, Four Weddings and a Funeral) second stint in the director’s chair after 2003’s Love Actually. But while he carved out his film career in charming romantic comedies often starring Hugh Grant and located in an idyllic, picture perfect version of England, he’s now clearing the decks and pushing full steam ahead with a laddish comedy that steers his ship into new waters – literally.

The film realises Curtis’s long-held ambition to build a movie on his love for 60s music and his fond youthful memories of a time when rock radio was illegal in the UK, forcing entrepreneurial mavericks to climb aboard ships and drop anchor outside the national jurisdiction where they then broadcast non-stop musical mayhem. And bringing such an endeavour to the big screen would require lots of music (estimates pitch the number of vinyl records onset in the 10,000 region), lots of 60s retro kitsch and lots of seasickness pills for the cast and crew.

Seasickness pills became part of the routine for many involved in the production as with the word boat in the title it was pretty mandatory that a boat appear in the film. And there is no sly CGI work here – the boat is real and very much a-rocking.