This film is best known as the first real attempt for Michael J. Fox to take on more serious roles after establishing himself as a comedic star. This is also one of the very few projects that Fox has smoked in front of the camera; although a chain smoker, he avoided being photographed with a cigarette, out of fear that this would encourage smoking.
This film was actually offered to Bruce Springsteen as an acting project (for what became the Michael J. Fox role) when he was thinking about going into film acting. He ultimately passed on this project (and dismissed the idea of going into films altogether).
The original title of the screenplay was "Born in the U.S.A." Paul Schrader asked Bruce Springsteen to write a title song for the movie. After Springsteen wrote this, he liked the song so much, he used for his multi-platinum album of the same name instead. As a replacement, Springsteen later wrote the song "Light of Day". That is why Springsteen thanks Schrader in the liner notes of the album.
The final scene, where the Barbusters perform in front of an adoring crowd, was shot twice. Bits of the first version can be seen in the music video for the song "Light of Day" (where Joan Jett's hair is in a noticeably different, fluffier style). Rolling Stone magazine reported that Jett was not happy with the first version, and asked that this be reshot. Director Paul Schrader said, "I was about to leave the set and wait out the storm in my trailer, but I listened to her arguments, and decided she was right."
Paul Schrader expressed dissatisfaction with this film, particularly its plain visual style: "I had progressed from being a person with a literary vision to a person with a visual vision, and in that film, I tried to, suppress my new literacy" and the casting of Joan Jett: "it's a good performance, but that piece of casting just did not work."