The three balloons seen during this movie's signature set piece, the air raid journey to the penthouse bank building vault for a tower heist of precious emerald gems, are known as "cloudhoppers". Also known as "Lindstrand Cloudhoppers", the one person balloons, fueled by burning gas, were invented in 1979 by Per Lindstrand. According to Lindstrand's website, almost as soon as the cloudhoppers were certified for use in the U.K., they were used in this movie.
The American release was delayed for several years due to a lack of a hook to sell it. Finally, Universal Pictures chose to send this movie direct to cable, where it debuted on HBO in 1984.
This movie was the first time that a device known as a "Fan Descender" was used on a movie. This device is the mechanism used for the descent down the front of the (at the time) tallest building in Mexico City where this movie was mostly filmed. The actual device was featured as a piece of equipment in the movie. Stuntman and Stunt Coordinator Vic Armstrong, who created the Fan Descender, was the stunt performer who personally used it to descend the entire height of the building. Armstrong was eventually awarded an Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Technical Achievement Award for creating the Fan Descender. This made Armstrong one of only three stuntmen ever awarded an Academy Award. The others were Yakima Canutt and Hal Needham. Richard Farnsworth also began his career as a stuntman and was Oscar nominated for Academy Awards twice for Une histoire vraie (1999) and Le souffle de la tempête (1978), but never won an Oscar.
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