Mickey Rourke was attempting a comeback from his self-imposed exile to professional boxing. He was also broke. Because of his wild reputation, studios were reluctant to cast him, and he was relegated to B-Grade action movies that went straight to video. Sean Penn was a big fan of Rourke, and he insisted on casting him in a small but pivotal scene as the grieving father of a murdered child. After this small part, Rourke began to get offered larger roles with bigger studios.
The picture was a passion project for producer and director Sean Penn and Jack Nicholson. Unfortunately, the screenplay was turned down by every major studio in Hollywood. Producer Elie Samaha, and his studio Franchise Pictures, who specialized in picking up screenplays in turnaround, quickly pounced on the material and signed up Penn and Nicholson for a reduced fee. The pair agreed, as long as Penn could have complete creative and casting control.
The photograph of Jerry Black (Jack Nicholson) as a younger man is the same one used in "The Shining (1980)."
This is an adaptation of a Friedrich Dürrenmatt novel that was based on a story he wrote for the German movie "Es geschah am hellichten Tag (1958)," which had a slightly different, less bleak ending. In that movie, the murderer was played by Gert Fröbe, who played Auric Goldfinger in "Goldfinger (1964)."
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