The real Dith Pran went on to work as a celebrated photographer for the New York Times, often speaking out about the Cambodian genocide. He died of pancreatic cancer in 2008 at the age of 65, nursed in his final days by his ex-wife and his best friend, Sydney Schanberg.
In real life, Haing S. Ngor's wife died under the Khmer Rouge regime, haemorrhaging during childbirth (the baby also died). She knew that she couldn't contact her husband as doctors were all being murdered by the regime so by keeping her silence and dying of internal bleeding, she effectively saved his life.
Haing S. Ngor became only the second non-professional actor to win an Oscar, following Harold Russell in William Wyler's The Best Years of Our Lives (1946).
Haing S. Ngor had to flee the set after re-enacting the harrowing scene where he is faced down by a female teenage soldier as it evoked too many horrific memories of his time spent living under the Khmer Rouge regime.
Pol Pot was still mounting an insurgency in Cambodia (after Vietnam had overthrown the Khmer Rouge) when the film was being made in neighbouring Thailand. In fact, the Thai authorities were very keen to have the horrors of Pol Pot's regime depicted onscreen as it would bring international attention to the political situation there.