In 1945, Hildegard Knef spent 3 months in a POW camp in Poland, while in the movie, her character Susanne Wallner is said to be returning from a concentration camp.
It was the first German movie after World War II
Shortly before the premiere, it was decided that leading actor Ernst 'Wilhelm Borchert' was not to be mentioned on posters and in the credits, since he had forged his forms of denazification. He had omitted that he had been a member of the NSDAP since 1933, but it later turned out his connection to the party was without further consequences.
Staudte was originally planning on calling the movie "Der Mann, den ich töten werde" (The man who I will kill), and it was supposed to end with Dr. Mertens killing Brueckner. The final scene was modified due to concerns of the soviet granter of license. There were also concerns that Germans, aware of guilty former-Nazis in their own community, would follow the example of the movie's hero and enact their own vigilante justice.
The world premiere took place just one day before the first sentences in the Nuremberg Trails were carried out, and ten war criminals were hanged.