The idea for the movie came from director Jafar Panahi's prison experience between July 2022 and February 2023, which stopped after a hunger strike, even though he had a six-year prison sentence. Then, he met and talked to many other fellow inmates, which prompted him to make a movie about what would such people do, after being released.
The movie was shot in secret, without a filming permit from the Islamic Republic. Also, the actresses in the movie mostly wear no hijab, which is mandatory for women in Iran. Despite those efforts, near the end of the shoot, policemen came to the crew and asked for the rushes, and even threatened to arrest the whole crew and stop the production when director Jafar Panahi refused, but after a while, they eventually relented and filming went on without a hitch all the way to the end.
With Un simple accidente (2025) winning the Palme d'Or at the 78th Cannes Film Festival, Jafar Panahi became the only filmmaker in history to win the highest honors at all four of the world's major international film festivals. He previously won the Caméra d'Or at Cannes for his debut film El globo blanco (1995), the Golden Leopard at the Locarno Film Festival for El espejo (1997), the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival for El círculo (2000) and the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival for Taxi Teherán (2015). This remarkable achievement places Panahi among the most awarded and respected auteurs in the history of world cinema.
Unlike many Iranian movies which are critical of the Iranian regime and thus omit the names of the cast and crew to protect them, this one displays the names of most of them, and several actors and crew members even accompanied writer/director Jafar Panahi to the 2025 Cannes Film Festival.
The entirety of the post-production was done in France, to prevent the Iranian authorities from meddling.