Principal photography had been completed in October, 1951, but the amount of coverage shot by George Stevens resulted in such an extremely protracted editing process that the film wasn't released until August, 1953. All this drove up the costs of what should have been a simple, straightforward Western; in fact, they spiraled so much that Paramount approached Howard Hughes about taking on the property, but he declined. He changed his mind when he saw a rough cut and offered to buy the film on the spot. This made Paramount rethink its strategy--originally it was going to release it as a "B" picture but then decided it should be one of the studio's flagship films of the year. This proved to be a good decision, as the film was a major success and easily recouped its inflated budget.
Fifty-year-old Jean Arthur came out of semi-retirement largely as a favor to her friend, director George Stevens. After this picture (except for some television work in the 1960s) she retired from the film business completely.
In the funeral scene, the dog consistently refused to look into the grave. Finally, director George Stevens had the dog's trainer lie down in the bottom of the grave, and the dog played his part ably. The coffin, loaded with rocks for appropriate effect, was then lowered into the grave, but when the harmonica player began to play "Dixie" spontaneously, the crew was so moved by the scene that they began shoveling dirt into the grave before remembering that a live person was still down there.
The first gunshots in the film are when Shane shows Joey how to fire a revolver. To enhance the dramatic effect of the shooting, the sounds of the gunshots were elevated by firing a gun into a garbage pail. The echoed reverberations made the gunfire sounds much louder. George Stevens' intention was to startle the audience with the first firing of a gun.
Jack Palance had problems with his horse during filming. When Shane and Jack first look each other over at the Starrett Ranch, Palance was supposed to dismount for a minute, then remount his horse. He could not remount, so the director had Jack dismount his horse slowly, then ran the film in reverse for the remount.