According to Gene Evans, Samuel Fuller wanted to shoot a long line of tired, retreating soldiers, but on that particular day when there were a lot of action pictures being shot, virtually all the extras were otherwise engaged, so 200 chorus boys, who had just finished working on the Fox lot and were available, were pressed into service. In order to get them to march more realistically, according to Evans, Fuller got the craftspeople to outfit them with 50-pound weights to make them look more like tired, retreating soldiers.
This movie was originally going to star Rory Calhoun, Jeffrey Hunter, Gary Merrill and Robert Wagner, according to a May 1951 edition of "The Hollywood Reporter".
Gene Evans' Sgt. Rock is an extension of the tough character he played in Samuel Fuller's previous Korean War film, Capacete de Aço (1951), albeit under a different name, Sgt. Zack.
Filmed in 20 days in the summer of 1951.