With this film, Jérôme Le Gris aimed to make a modern Alfred Hitchcock-style thriller. In particular the character of Lucrèce is supposed to be a take on the "Hitchcock Blonde" and the music aims to be similar to that of Bernard Herrmann.
Preparing for her directorial debut, Mélanie Laurent used this film's shoot to familiarize herself with all the aspects of movie making, to the point of doing mini-internships in all the different departments.
This is the second French movie in which Tchéky Karyo plays a character who is a handler and mentor to a female assassin (the first is Nikita (1990)).
All of Lucrèce's clothes were taken from the Balenciaga collection.