The climax was filmed at Beachy Head, a notorious suicide spot. A woman tried to kill herself by driving her car off the cliff on the night of filming.
Phil Davis (Frank Spicer) previously played the mod Chalky in Quadrophenia (1979), which was likewise set in Brighton in 1964.
Carey Mulligan was cast as Rose, but was replaced by Andrea Riseborough after Mulligan dropped out to do Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010).
Although set in Brighton, most of this was shot in the neighboring seaside town of Eastbourne.