At one point in the film, Gerald Mortenhoe (Max von Sydow) tells some historical facts about the Medieval French Composer Robert De Bauleac, while listening to one of his works on a record player. When the film was released, numerous music lovers tried to get a copy of the same record in specialized stores, which could never provide any for a very good reason: Robert De Bauleac has never existed, and the composition heard in the film is Antoine Duhamel's work. However, the concerned piece of music, "Robert De Bauleac's Lament," has been since available as part of the complete movie soundtrack.
According to co-writer and director Bertrand Tavernier, the young boy playing football in the park sequence is David, Romy Schneider's son, who died by accident a couple of years after shooting. Romy herself died two years after the film's release, at the age of 43.
This is Robbie Coltrane's first motion picture.
Dedicated to French director Jacques Tourneur, who was groundbreaking in movies with dark subjects, from early horror films like Cat People, The Leopard Man, I Walked With a Zombie, and Curse of the Demon (aka Night of the Demon) to film noir like Out of the Past, Nightfall, and The Fearmakers.
Forerunner to movies like The Truman Show and EDtv and other shows about someone's life being filmed, whether they are aware of it or not.