Bula Quo!

2013 British film

5 July 2013 (2013-07-05)

Running time

91 minutesCountriesUnited Kingdom
FijiLanguagesEnglish
Fijian

Bula Quo! is a 2013 British adventure comedy film cowritten and directed by Stuart St Paul and starring Jon Lovitz, Craig Fairbrass, Laura Aikman and Status Quo musicians Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt. The film was made as a tax deductible write-off for the band Status Quo, and the budget of the film was part of what was owed to the UK taxman; at the time production started there was a scheme, set up by the previous Labour Government of Gordon Brown, to allow taxpayers to invest a certain amount of money in low-to-medium budget United Kingdom films as an incentive to expand it and keep people in the industry in work.^[1]

Although this film was made primarily in Fiji it was classed as a UK production because it utilized a primarily British cast and crew.^[2] Several other (technically) British films were made using this same tax incentives, including Hitchcock (2012) and Cleanskin (2012). Bula Quo! was a box-office disaster at the time of its release, and received mostly negative reviews from critics.

Synopsis

The film is set in the Pacific island country of Fiji and tells the story of rock band Status Quo becoming entangled in a local mafia operation.^[3]

Cast

Francis Rossi as Francis
Rick Parfitt as Rick
Jon Lovitz as Wilson
Craig Fairbrass as Simon
Laura Aikman as Caroline
Matt Kennard as Dave

Rick Parfitt and Francis Rossi of Status Quo and Laura Aikman at the 2013 UK film premiere of Bula Quo!

Reception

Rotten Tomatoes gave the film an aggregated score of 27%.^[4]

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Bula Quo!.

^ Status Quo's latest project starts with guitars, ends with guns 9-4-2013, Goldmine Magazine
^ Status Quo: rocking all over Berlin. BY MICHAEL ROSSER - FEBRUARY 2013 Screen Daily
^ Richards, Olly (2013). "Bula Quo!". Empire (film magazine). Bauer Media Group. Retrieved 3 July 2013.
^ "Bula Quo!". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 5 February 2023.