According to director Mark Robson, Alan Ladd was a very unhappy man. During the shooting, he badly wounded his hand whilst he played football, but insisted on keeping working and not stopping the production of the film.
Actual whale hunting expeditions were filmed for use in the film.
When the film premiered in Hollywood in 1954, Alan Ladd gave a few mounted actual whale teeth to special guests on opening night. He was actually on the ship during some of the filming. The tooth "trophies" are highly collectible today. Each has a plaque identifying them as coming from the movie.
The Southern Truce whale catcher is an actual ship built in England in 1945 and was used for whaling in Antartica until 1963, at which point it was sold and used as a cargo ship under several names.
The Kista Dan is an actual Class-1 icebreaker built in1952 that was used in the Antartic region, including work on establishing the first permanent workstation in Antartica called Mawson Station.