Contrary to popular belief the film was never banned in the UK. However despite some TV showings it was never submitted to the BBFC until 1998 where it received an uncut video PG video certificate.
Filmed July 18-late August 17 1945, the third and last collaboration between Boris Karloff and producer Val Lewton.
In one of the street scenes, a flower seller is heard calling. "Lavender, sweet blooming lavender,/ Six bunches a penny today, /Lavender, sweet blooming lavender,/ Ladies buy it while you may." This is an actual old street cry from London.
Pompey, the boy, is playing 'conkers', a child's game with chestnuts on strings, in the waiting room.
Sims quote, "He who steals my purse steals trash" is from 'Othello' Act 3, scene 3, 155-161 by William Shakespeare. It is spoken by the character Iago.
The comment Sims makes to Nell about the inmates, "Fierce as wild bulls, untameable as flies, these have oft from strangers' side snatched rapiers suddenly and done much harm", is a quote from the play, 'The Honest Whore' by Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton
The dress Anna Lee is wearing as she mounts her horse is the one Vivien Leigh made from the curtains in Gone with the Wind.
When Sims says to Nell "I leave you to dream of these Augean labors", he is referring to the Labors of Hercules, one of which was to cleanse the Augean stables (the stables of Augeas).